Mayrovitz Harvey N, Fasen Madeline, Spagna Paige, Wong Jennifer
College of Medical Sciences, Nova Southeastern University, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, USA.
Clin Physiol Funct Imaging. 2018 Jul;38(4):670-675. doi: 10.1111/cpf.12466. Epub 2017 Aug 10.
skin tissue dielectric constant (TDC) measurements help assess local skin water to detect incipient early-stage lymphedema subsequent to breast cancer treatment-related lymphedema. However, presurgery measurements are not always obtained and assessments for evolving lymphedema are only made after surgery. Thus, subsequent TDC assessments may be biased in an unknown way dependent on a patient's handedness in relation to the at-risk arm. We investigated this issue by comparing TDC values in dominant and non-dominant volar forearms of 31 left-handed women and 31 right-handed women (age range 24-84 years). Body fat and water percentages were assessed by bioimpedance at 50 KHz. Results showed that TDC values of dominant versus non-dominant arms did not significantly differ for left-handers or for right-handers. There was also no statistically significant difference in absolute TDC values between left- and right-handers or a statistically significant difference in dominant-to-non-dominant arm ratios between left- and right-handers. For the composite data set (N = 62), TDC values for dominant and non-dominant arms were, respectively, 30·0 ± 4·6 and 29·6 ± 4·2 and the dominant-to-non-dominant arm TDC ratio for combined left- and right-handers was 1·015 ± 0·075. These results suggest that handedness is not a major factor when assessing lymphedema status in women who have previously been treated for breast cancer but for whom pretreatment TDCvalues have not been obtained. Moreover, these results suggest that threshold ratios of incipient subclinical unilateral lymphedema based on interarm TDC ratios apply independent of a patient's handedness for the site and tissue depths herein measured.
皮肤组织介电常数（TDC）测量有助于评估局部皮肤水分，以检测乳腺癌治疗相关淋巴水肿后的早期初期淋巴水肿。然而，术前测量并非总能进行，且对于正在发展的淋巴水肿的评估仅在术后进行。因此，后续的TDC评估可能会以一种未知的方式产生偏差，这种偏差取决于患者相对于患侧手臂的利手情况。我们通过比较31名左利手女性和31名右利手女性（年龄范围24 - 84岁）优势侧和非优势侧掌侧前臂的TDC值来研究这个问题。通过50kHz的生物电阻抗评估身体脂肪和水分百分比。结果显示，左利手或右利手的优势侧与非优势侧手臂的TDC值没有显著差异。左利手和右利手之间的绝对TDC值也没有统计学上的显著差异，且左利手和右利手之间优势侧与非优势侧手臂的比例也没有统计学上的显著差异。对于综合数据集（N = 62），优势侧和非优势侧手臂的TDC值分别为30.0±4.6和29.6±4.2，左利手和右利手合并后的优势侧与非优势侧手臂TDC比值为1.015±0.075。这些结果表明，对于先前接受过乳腺癌治疗但未获得术前TDC值的女性，在评估淋巴水肿状态时，利手不是一个主要因素。此外，这些结果表明，基于双臂TDC比值的初期亚临床单侧淋巴水肿的阈值比值适用于本文所测量的部位和组织深度，与患者的利手无关。
