SENODAY: A New Perspective of Handling Breast Cancer

Background: To evaluate the feasibility of a same day breast cancer diagnosis and management protocol, consequently decreasing time to treatment and immediately reassuring patients with benign diagnosis.

Materials and methods: A total of 60 women underwent breast exam during SENODAY in our cancer center between January 2020 and December 2022. Patients are first seen by a breast surgeon who mentions whether the patient's history and physical exam are suspicious of malignancy. Patients are then sent to the radiologist who performs a complete radiologic assessment, classifies the lesions, and performs a biopsy when necessary. The specimen is sent to the pathologist who uses the imprint cytology technique to obtain a preliminary diagnosis. Effective counseling is established in case of breast cancer diagnosis.

Results: Among 60 women, 25 patients were reassured by breast imaging and 35 underwent histopathological analysis (17 patients with a 1-day protocol and 18 with the standard definitive technique). Clinical examination was found to have a sensitivity of 100% and a specificity of 89.47%. The positive predictive value was 80 % and the negative predictive value was 100%. However, we did not find a strong correlation between imaging and definitive pathology. Moreover, on imprint cytology, sensitivity, specificity, PPV, and NPV were 100%. Finally, the mean time-to-treat was 28.6 days.

Conclusions: SENODAY reassured 68.3% of patients. It also offered effective counseling and a treatment plan to newly diagnosed breast cancer patients within 1 day. Same day histological diagnosis by imprint cytology is effective and feasible with an excellent accuracy.