Sonological Evaluation of the Clinically Negative Axilla in Women with Breast Cancer

The prognosis of breast carcinoma is dramatically altered by the presence of axillary lymph nodes. Hence, great importance is now given to axillary staging, One of the baseline investigations done for the axilla is sonology, to identify suspicious nodes. It is also part of the triad of triple assessment. This study aims to identify the common suspicious features of axillary nodes.40 patients with breast cancer and with clinically node negative axilla were taken up for the study, and ultrasound of the axilla was done for them. On correlation of specific sonological characteristics with US-FNAC, the feature most predictive of malignancy was the absence of fatty hilum (34 cases) Hypoechoic cortex was the second best predictor(32 cases), followed by L/D ratio(31 cases). The ability of ultra sonogram to detect more suspicious lymph nodes increased with increasing tumour size.

With Westernization, and development of previously backward countries, one of the drawbacks is the rise of breast cancer, due to the life style, and unhealthy diet. Studies show that 1 in 8 women develop breast cancer during their life time. Of these, early detection and aggressive treatment can help cure them completely. A factor which dramatically changes the prognosis of the patient is the presence or absence of ipsilateral axillary nodal metastasis¹.This can be evaluated radiologically by sonology.