Affiliations: Department of Breast Imaging, Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital, National Clinical Research Center for Cancer, Key Laboratory of Cancer Prevention and Therapy, Tianjinโs Clinical Research Center for Cancer, Key Laboratory of Breast Cancer Prevention and Therapy, Tianjin Medical University, Ministry of Education, Tianjin 300060, China
Correspondence:
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Corresponding author: Peifang Liu, Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital, Huan-Hu-Xi Road, Ti-Yuan-Bei, He Xi District, Tianjin, China. Tel.: +86 022 23359929; Fax: +86 022 23359929; E-mail: cjr.liupeifang@vip.163.com.
Abstract: This study aimed to analyze the correlation between mammographic density obtained by density analysis software (DAS)/radiologists visual (RV) classification with molecular subtype, and the expression levels of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR), Ki67 antigen (Ki-67), p53 gene (p53), and human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER2). A total of 688 breast cancer patients with digital mammography and complete molecular pathological results in Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital between February 2015 and February 2016 were collected. The DAS-density grade (DASD) and the radiologists visually classified density grade (RVD) were evaluated by 3 radiologists. The correlation between density grade and the expression levels of ER, PR, Ki-67, p53, HER2 and breast cancer molecular subtype (PMS) were analyzed. The agreement between DASD and RVD was explored. ER, PR and HER-2 positive rate were significantly different among patients with different RVD grades (P< 0.05). HER2 positive rates showed an increasing trend following RVD upgrading (P๐ก๐๐๐๐< 0.05). HER-2 positive rate in RVD D1 + D2 was 7.69%, which was higher than that in D3 + D4 (P< 0.05). The ER and Ki-67 expressions in patients were markedly different among DASD (P= 0.009 and 0.002) and RVD (P= 0.012 and 0.036) with different grades. The kappa value of each DASD to RVD was 0.31 (P< 0.01). The RVD 3 proportion was 14.58% (63/432) in HER2 Over-expressing subtype, which was apparently higher than RVD1 (2.43%, 1/41) (P< 0.05). Breast density may be partial correlated with molecular pathology in breast cancer.
Keywords: Breast cancer, mammographic density, molecular pathology, correlation
