Multimodal OCT characterization of human breast cancer morphological types: preliminary study

Introduction of innovative noninvasive diagnostic techniques in clinical practice remains an actual topic of modern medicine. In the study, we assessed feasibility of multimodal OCT (MM OCT) that combines crosspolarization imaging and elastographic stiffness mapping to assess spatial structural organization and heterogeneity of breast cancer in the tumor center in comparison with normal mammary gland tissue. The research was carried out using human breast tissue mastectomy surgical samples including different histological types of breast cancer: ductal carcinoma in situ, invasive lobular and ductal carcinoma, fibroadenoma and normal tissue. The histological subtypes of breast cancer showed different structural and stiffness features of tumor tissue. In the case of invasive ductal carcinoma, the cross-polarization OCT image shows a more heterogeneous high-level OCT signal and higher stiffness in comparison with lobular breast cancer or fibroadenoma. These results indicate that assessing microstructures and elasticity changes yields complementary information about the microstructural features of breast cancer, which is important for selection of treatment tactics.