Sentinel lymph node biopsy in clinically N 0 laryngeal cancer : validation and application

Material and Methods: A prospective study conducted at the Lithuanian University of Health Sciences Hospital, with the permission of institutional review board. Inclusion period 2010 – 2013y. Patients with histologically confirmed laryngeal SCC T1-2, N0 were involved. Two phase design: validation phase SLNB and selective neck dissection (SND) were performed simultaneously; application phase SND was performed according to SLNB outcome. The end points for SLNB validation phase: sensitivity, specificity, negativepredictive value (NPV). Patients from both phases were followed-up after treatment and compared for recurrencefree survival (RFS). Sentinel lymph nodes (SLN) were located by 99mTc lymphoscintigraphy and gamma probe. Pathological evaluation included hematoxylin and eosin staining and immunohistochemistry. Statistical analysis was performed by using SPSS® v20.0, Clinical Calculator 1, ©Richard Lowry 2001-2015.The Pearson X2 was used for categorical data. Significant p-value <0.05. RFS was investigated performing a log-rank test.