Intraoperative examination of axillary sentinel lymph nodes in breast carcinoma patients

Routine histologic examination of axillary sentinel lymph nodes predicts axillary lymph node status and may spare patients with breast carcinoma axillary lymph node dissection. To avoid the need for two separate surgical sessions, the results of sentinel lymph node examination should be available intraoperatively. However, routine frozen-section examination of sentinel lymph nodes is liable to yield false-negative results. This study was conducted to ascertain whether extensive intraoperative examination of sentinel lymph nodes by frozen section examination would attain a sensitivity comparable to that obtained by routine histologic examination without intraoperative frozen section examination.