Objective: To evaluate ultrasound-guided or freehand percutaneous core needle biopsy in histopathological assessment of primary breast cancer lesions and its utility in primary breast cancer treatment.
Methods: Retrospectively analysis of the clinical data of 697 primary breast cancer examined by mean of core needle biopsy.
Results: The diagnostic accuracy, false negative rate and insufficiency rate was 90.5%, 8.9% and 0.6%, respectively. Diagnostic accuracy was significantly higher in ultrasound guiding comparing to palpable guiding (92.7% vs. 88.2%, P < 0.05). There was a nonsignificant trend toward increased false negative rate in palpable guiding (10.9% vs. 7.1%, P > 0.05).
Conclusion: Percutaneous core needle biopsy is reliable in histopathological assessment of primary breast cancer lesions. Ultrasound guiding was superior to palpable guiding in term of diagnostic accuracy in this study.