Abstract: Sentinel lymph node biopsy has become the standard procedure for evaluating regional lymph node status in early breast cancer. In need of precision therapy and prognosis prediction for breast cancer patients, there still exist clinical issues worthy of further discussion, including clinical application of new tracers, prognostic value of internal mammary sentinel lymph node biopsy and safety profiling of exempting axillary lymph node dissection after neoadjuvant chemotherapy in node-positive patients. In this review, based on relevant articles, we fully discussed recent progress concerning the study of sentinel lymph node, which may propel a norm on surgical diagnosis and treatment of early breast cancer.

Key words: Breast cancer, Sentinel lymph node, Tracer, Internal mammary sentinel lymph node