Bronchial wash cytology: A study on morphology and morphometry

Bronchial wash cytology of lung lesions is a non/minimally invasive procedure utilized for diagnosis of pulmonary lesions.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of bronchial wash cytology in the diagnosis of bronchopulmonary lesions and assess the role of morphometry in categorizing dysplastic/malignant lesions.

All cases of bronchial wash cytology received from January 2006 to June 2010 were retrieved and reviewed. Cases with adequate clinical data or a subsequent biopsy were selected for the study and cytodiagnosis was correlated with available clinical details. Morphometry was done on alcohol fixed hematoxylin and eosin stained cytosmears using computer assisted Image Pro software.

One hundred and seventy-six cases of the 373 cases of bronchial cytology received were included for the study. Bronchial wash cytology technique showed high specificity. Cytohistopathology correlation showed 62.06% concordance rate. Cells from normal epithelium, reactive atypia, neoplastic atypia, squamous metaplasia, non-small cell and small cell carcinoma showed a mean nuclear diameter of 7.4 μm, 11.7 μm, 13.9 μm, 13.0 μm, 10.7 μm, and 17.7 μm, respectively, which was statistically significant with P < 0.05. Multiple comparisons between various groups using analysis of variance and Bonferroni tests also showed remarkable statistical significance.

Bronchial wash cytology has low sensitivity in detecting pulmonary lesions. It can be of value in patients with contraindication for biopsy. Morphometry can be a useful adjunct to cytomorphology, especially in situations where biopsy is contraindicated.