transvaginal Us breast cancer tamoxifen

PURPOSE: To assess the long-term natural history of simple ovarian cysts diagnosed in postmenopausal patients with breast carcinoma treated with tamoxifen citrate. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Of 332 postmenopausal women with breast cancer who were treated with tamoxifen, 32 (9.6%) had simple ovarian cysts. Long-term follow-up transvaginal ultrasonography (US) was performed in patients who had these simple ovarian cysts, and serum CA 125 samples were taken. Standard linear regression analysis with repeated measurements with irregular time points with the mixed-effects model was used to correlate cyst size at transvaginal US with the time elapsed since the diagnosis of ovarian cysts...

Breast cancer is among the commonest malignant diseases in women. Over the past two decades tamoxifen has been generally accepted as an endocrine therapy of choice for prevention of breast cancer recurrence. Although tamoxifen was thought to have only a few adverse effects, several reports indicate that it is associated with an increase incidence of proliferative and neoplastic changes in the endometrium, with a 1.3 to 7.5 relative risk of developing endometrial carcinoma. The increased risk of endometrial cancer following the use of tamoxifen has stimulated studies on endometrial diagnostic screening methods...

Tamoxifen citrate therapy increases the prevalence of benign and malignant uterine lesions. At transvaginal ultrasonography (US), the finding of a thickened central endometrial complex, with or without cystic changes, is often nonspecific and may be caused by an endometrial polyp, submucosal leiomyoma (fibroid), endometrial hyperplasia, carcinoma, or cystic atrophy. In addition, because of an increased prevalence of adenomyosis or adenomyosis-like changes in women receiving tamoxifen, proper transvaginal US assessment of endometrial thickness and abnormalities is difficult in some women...

PURPOSE: To determine performance characteristics of transvaginal ultrasonography (US) and hysterosonography for diagnosing endometrial abnormality in asymptomatic postmenopausal women with breast cancer receiving tamoxifen. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The authors prospectively examined 138 women receiving tamoxifen by using transvaginal US, hysterosonography, and office hysteroscopy. The combined hysteroscopic-histopathologic diagnosis was the reference standard. Sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values, and likelihood ratios of transvaginal US and hysterosonography were calculated...

Tamoxifen is a non-steroidal estrogen antagonist used mainly in the adjuvant therapy of breast cancer. Tamoxifen acts primarily as an antiestrogen, but also carries estrogenic effect, mainly to the endometrium. Although diverse pathological uterine findings has been described in connection with the long term use of this drug, there is no widely accepted protocol for the monitoring of the endometrium in these patients. All patients referred for gynecologic examination at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology University Medical School Debrecen, Hungary with previous treatment for breast cancer were involved in a screening programme...

Tamoxifen has been widely used in the treatment of breast cancer. The effects on the uterus include epithelial metaplasia, hyperplasia and even carcinoma. Transvaginal sonography has been used for visualization of endometrial changes during tamoxifen treatment. However, its use has disclosed that the drug may cause cystic changes in the subendometrial zone without epithelial pathology. Therefore, other sonographic techniques have been suggested for the evaluation of the patient receiving tamoxifen treatment, among them saline contrast hysterosonography and endometrial blood flow studies...