A new method that allows researchers to visualize sentinel lymph node drainage in mice may be able to detect lymph node metastases from breast cancer.

Lymph node metastases are an indicator of prognosis in breast cancer patients and a major criterion in determining the need for adjuvant chemotherapy. Although a biopsy can detect these metastases, there is a need for an accurate and noninvasive method of detection.

Hisataka Kobayashi, M.D., Ph.D., of the National Cancer Institute, and colleagues developed a method in which nano-size molecules were used as contrast agents during magnetic resonance imaging to detect sentinel lymph node drainage in normal mice and mouse models of breast cancer. Their results were published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Using this method, regions of sentinel lymph nodes that contained metastatic tumors appeared as black spots while regions without tumors and lymph nodes in normal mice appeared white. This new imaging method, the authors conclude, has the potential to be used to detect sentinel lymph node metastases in human breast cancer patients.

SOURCE:
Journal of the National Cancer Institute, May 5, 2004