Dose-time and Source-dependent Analysis of Intraoperative Radiotherapy-treated Seroma on Breast Cancer Cell Types: A Pilot Study

Intraoperative radiation therapy (IORT) is a novel approach to breast cancer (BC) treatment.

In this study, we compared the cellular and molecular effects of IORT-treated post-lumpectomy wound fluid (seroma) at the point of IOeRT versus IOxRT on the BC cell line.

Immortalized human BC cell lines: MCF-7, MDA-MB-231, and MCF10 were incubated with seroma from 3 groups of patients (as a pilot study). The first group received Intraoperative electron radiation therapy (IOeRT, Boost dose=12Gy), the second one received IOeRT (Radical dose=21Gy), and the third group was prescribed Intraoperative x-ray radiation therapy (IOxRT, X-ray=20Gy). Cellular and molecular tests were used to investigate how cells are influenced by the IORT-treated seroma.

We evaluated the effects of dose-time and source-dependent IORT-treated seroma on BC cell lines. In this study, we observed that IOxRT-treated seroma has the most significant effects on the reduction of proliferation, induced cell cycle arrest, and apoptosis. Furthermore, inhibited migration and invasion of BC cell lines were compared to IOeRT -treated seroma.

Although this is a pilot study, we suggest that at 24 h, the IORT (specifically IOxRT)-treated seroma may play an important protective role in the breast tumor bed, which is followed by local recurrence decreases.