Reproducibility of Assessment of Lepidic (Noninvasive) Patterns in Lung Adenocarcinoma With Cytokeratin Immunostain Compared With Hematoxylin and Eosin and the Proposed New International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) Algorithm

Introduction

Lepidic growth is considered noninvasive in lung nonmucinous adenocarcinoma, whereas other patterns are invasive. Considerable interobserver variability in assessing “invasion” has been reported. We assessed the utility of cytokeratin 7 (CK7) stain and recently proposed International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer criteria to improve assessment of noninvasion in lung adenocarcinoma.

Methods

Four pathologists (two staff, two trainees) assessed 158 hematoxylin and eosin (HE)- and CK7-stained slides of 108 pT1N0-2 nonmucinous lung adenocarcinoma cases. Scoring took place in four rounds. First, sections were independently scored for percentage of noninvasive or probable noninvasive and invasive or probable invasive patterns. Second, after a consensus scoring algorithm for CK7 was formulated, the slides were rescored. Subsequent third-round scoring was conducted only on HE slides using the 2023 International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer proposed criteria, and fourth-round scoring on both HE and CK7 slides simultaneously. Intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was calculated for each round. Recurrence-free survival was assessed using Cox proportional hazards regression methods.

Results

In the first two rounds, interobserver concordance was consistently higher with CK7 (ICC range = 0.44–0.6) than HE (range = 0.24–0.49) scores. The IASLC proposed algorithm improved ICC of HE scores to 0.60 (95% confidence interval: 0.52–0.67), and round 4 HE and CK7 combined improved ICC to 0.75 (95% confidence interval: 0.70–0.80). Continuous measures of averaged noninvasive and probable noninvasive scores on HE were associated with improved recurrence-free survival (hazard ratio: 0.83–0.86).

Conclusions

CK7 staining consistently increased interobserver concordance in assessment of invasive versus noninvasive patterns than HE. Combining CK7 with the 2023 IASLC criteria for morphologic features of invasion may further improve the interobservers’ concordance for the recognition of lepidic growth in nonmucinous lung adenocarcinoma.