The combination of blue dye and radioisotope versus radioisotope alone during sentinel lymph node biopsy for breast cancer: a systematic review

摘要

Background The combination of blue dye and radioisotope is most widely used to identify sentinel lymph nodes (SLNs) in patients with breast cancer. However, some individual studies suggested that dual tracers did not have an advantage over radioisotope alone in detecting SLNs. We performed a systematic review to investigate the added value of blue dye in addition to radioisotope. Methods We searched Pubmed and Embase. Prospective studies that compared the combination of radioisotope and blue dye with radioisotope alone were selected. The identification rate of SLNs and the false-negative rate were the main outcomes of interest. The odds ratios (ORs) and 95?% confidential intervals (CIs) were calculated by using random-effects model. Results Twenty-four studies were included. The combination of radioisotope and blue dye showed higher identification rate than radioisotope alone (OR?=?2.03, 95?% CI 1.53–2.69, P ?0.05), or for studies with high proportion of patients with positive lymphoscintigraphy (OR?=?1.41, 95?% CI 0.83–2.39, P >?0.05). Dual tracers did not significantly lower the false-negative rate compared with radioisotope alone (OR?=?0.76, 95?% CI 0.44–1.29, P >?0.05). Conclusions Although the combination of blue dye and radioisotope outperformed radioisotope alone in SLN detection, the superiority for dual tracers may be limited for patients with positive lymphoscintigraphy or for those after neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Besides, the combined modality did not help lower the false-negative rate.