RNA recovery from specimens of duct-washing cytology performed contemporaneously with mammary ductoscopy.

We extracted RNAs from 37 DWC samples. RNA from 12 samples exhibited RNA integrities of  ≥ 6, indicative of moderate-to-high quality. We then showed that cocaine and amphetamine regulated transcript prepropeptide (CARTPT) and breast cancer-associated transcript 54 (BRCAT54) mRNA-previously shown by microarray analysis to be highly expressed in DCIS-were detectable in these samples. Therefore, DWC samples may be useful for molecular diagnosis involving RNA biomarkers.