Evaluation of residual cellularity and proliferation on preoperatively treated breast cancer: a comparison between image analysis and light microscopy analysis.

Histopathology has been suggested as a reliable method for tumour reduction evaluation of preoperatively treated breast cancer. Immunocytochemistry can be used to enhance the visibility of residual tumour cellularity and in the evaluation of its proliferative activity. We compared Image Analysis (IA) with Light Microscopy Analysis (LMA) on sections of breast carcinomas treated with preoperative chemo- or chemo/radiotherapy in the evaluation of the Neoplastic Cell Density (NCD) (69 cases) and the Proliferation Index (PI) (35 cases). NCD was expressed as the immunoreactive area to cytokeratin over the total original neoplastic area and PI was expressed as the number of immunostained tumoural nuclei with MIB 1 MoAb over the total of tumoural nuclei. The intraobserver agreement and that between IA and LMA for both indices were estimated by the common (kappa(w)) and the jackknife weighted kappa statistic (kappa(w)). The extent of agreement of each considered category was also assessed by means of the category-specific kappa statistics (kappa(cs)). The intraobserver agreement within LMA for NCD and PI and that between IA and LMA for PI were both satisfactory. Upon evaluation of the NCD, the agreement between IA and LMA showed unsatisfactory results, especially when the ratio between the residual tumour cells and the background was critical.