Abstract

Fine needle aspiration (FNA) cytology of breast disease is recognized to be highly accurate and cost effective, especially when this is used in combination with clinical examination and imaging as part of a triple approach. A probabilistic/categorical approach is used for the classification of breast FNA specimens. Criteria are defined from the perspective of the likelihood of making a definitive diagnosis of cancer on excision. This approach is an accurate way of classifying breast FNA specimens, and this can be reliably applied regardless of the level of experience of the pathologist for interpreting the case. When a definitive diagnosis of malignancy is made, the next step is to determining the specific histologic types of the malignancy according to their cytological features. In order to make an accurate diagnosis of carcinoma and for correct typing a tumor, an adequate, correctly sampled aspirate without any other artifacts is required.

• Keywords: MalignantMalignant;Breast;FNA cytology