Clinical Value of Peripheral Blood Circulating Tumor Cells and Cell-Free DNA Combined Detection in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer

Objective: To determine the clinical value of combined detection of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) and cell-free DNA (cfDNA) in peripheral blood of patients with triple-negative breast cancer. Method: 41 patients with breast cancer admitted to the First Central Hospital of Baoding from January 2020 to December 2021 were selected and recruited into the experimental group, 42 patients with benign breast cancer admitted during the same period were recruited into the conditional control group, and 41 healthy patients admitted during the same period were recruited into the blank control group. The positive rate of peripheral blood CTCs, the level of cfDNA, and the diagnostic efficacy of peripheral blood CTCs, cfDNA alone and the combination thereof for breast cancer were analyzed. Result: The positive rates of peripheral blood CTCs in the experimental group, the conditional control group, and the blank control group were 43.90%, 11.90%, and 9.74%, respectively, and there was significant difference among the groups. The levels of cfDNA in peripheral blood of the experimental group, the conditional control group, and the blank control group were 0.26 ± 0.08 bp, 0.17 ± 0.03 bp, and 0.15 ± 0.04 bp, respectively, which were statistically significant. The detection levels of 100 bp hTERT/ng·ml-1 and 241 bp hTERT/ng·ml-1 in the experimental group were significantly higher than those in the conditional control group and the blank control group. The accuracy of peripheral blood CTCs detection in the three groups was 66.21%, the accuracy of cfDA241 bp / 100 bp hTERT detection was 80.41%, and the accuracy of combined detection of peripheral blood CTCs and cfDNA was 94.03%. Conclusion: The clinical application of peripheral blood CTCs combined with cfDNA level detection can increase detection accuracy, provide data support for clinicians, and improve the clinical diagnostic effect of triple-negative breast cancer.