Expression data from Fine Needle Aspiration (FNA) biopsies from breast cancer patients

This is a stage-matched case control study. Cases with clinical diagnosis of Inflammatory Breast Cancer (IBC) were selected after reviewing all medical records of the 440 FNA samples. IBC was defined as signs of erythema and edema (peau d’orange) involving at least one third of the skin and rapid clinical presentation. Presence of tumor emboli in the dermal lymphatics of the involved skin in the pathology report was not required for inclusion as IBC. Controls were selected to match for T stage, all T4a-c tumors in the data set were included as controls. IBC breast cancer are all T4d breast cancer. We examined if gene expression differences exist between IBC and stage-matched Non-IBC stratified according to hormone receptor and HER2 status. Pre-treatment FNA from primary tumors were obtained and RNA extracted and hybridized to Affymetrix microarrays according to manufacturer protocol.