A potential source of false-positive sentinel nodes - Immunostain misadventure

The clinical and pathologic aspects of sentinel lymph node biopsy have gene rated much attention. Pitfalls in the pathologic handling of sentinel lymph node specimens have received little attention. We report a case in which a false-positive diagnosis might have been rendered on a sentinel lymph node because of an inadvertent immunostaining error. Attention was drawn to the problem by an unusual pattern of distribution of immunoreactive cells-whic h proved to be plasma cells rather than metastatic carcinoma cells.