HER2 testing in metastatic breast cancer – is reflex in situ hybridization necessary in cases that are equivocal by immunohistochemistry?
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract Introduction/Objective Current guidelines recommend HER2 testing on all primary invasive breast cancers and at least one metastatic lesion. Typical HER2 testing involves immunohistochemistry (IHC), with reflex in situ hybridization (ISH) in the event of equivocal (2+) IHC. ISH testing is time consuming and resource intensive, and there may be situations where it is unnecessary. The incidence of discordance between HER2 negative primary tumors and HER2 IHC2+ metastases that are ISH positive is unknown. We hypothesize that the majority of such cases are non- amplified. Methods/Case Report A retrospective review of IHC2+ metastatic lesions further assessed with ISH at our center from 2013-2021 was undertaken. A total of 105 cases were identified after exclusion of cases missing HER2 results, with primaries of unconfirmed origin, and cases of synchronous primary and metastatic disease. IHC and ISH results were recorded, with a detailed slide review of discordant cases. Results (if a Case Study enter NA) 91/105 metastases had HER2 negative primaries (87%). A metastasis was significantly more likely to be HER2 negative when the primary was HER2 negative (93%) versus positive (43%) (p < 0.0001). 54/91 primaries were IHC2+/ISH negative, and 50/54 (93%) corresponding metastases had identical results. Of the 37 HER2 negative primaries that were IHC0/1+, 35 (95%) corresponding metastatic tumors were ISH negative. Six metastatic lesions in cases with HER2 negative primaries were discordant and slides were reviewed. Characteristics of metastatic tumors suggesting ISH testing was warranted to assess for discordance included IHC heterogeneity, morphological discordance, and increased staining of moderate intensity. These factors were present in all six discordant metastases. Conclusion Our results suggest that selective rather than reflex ISH testing on HER2 IHC2+ breast cancer metastases in the context of HER2 negative primary disease may be appropriate when there is careful review of the IHC. Validation of our findings await further studies with larger sample sizes.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.011 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".