Abstract
Background
Routine staging investigations are not recommended for early breast cancer (EBC).
Staging scans and further confirmatory tests add to the cost of breast cancer treatment.
Despite recommendations from international guidelines, whole body bone scan (BS) is
commonly used for staging EBC. We examined our experience with BS as a staging investigation
when selectively used in EBC.
Patients and Methods
All EBC patients who underwent treatment through the Eastern Health breast unit during
a 50-month period from January 2012 were included in this study. All staging BS results
were reviewed to evaluate yield and false-positive rate. The causes of false-positive
results were analyzed. The role of BS when performed along with computed tomographic
scans of chest, abdomen, and pelvis (CTCAP) was evaluated.
Results
Even with the selective use of BS, we could only achieve a yield of 1% (95% confidence
interval, −0.6, 2.7) in EBC. When combined with CTCAP, only one additional metastasis
was detected in 194 BSs.
Conclusion
BS plays only a limited role in staging EBC. Patients who have undergone CTCAP will
experience minimal benefit by undergoing additional BS.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: July 08, 2020
Accepted:
July 6,
2020
Received in revised form:
June 6,
2020
Received:
April 3,
2020
Identification
Copyright
© 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
