Lung cancer (LC) occupies a leading place in the structure of morbidity and mortality among patients with cancer worldwide, which determines LC as an important medical and social problem for health systems.
LC is detected in more than two thirds of patients at a late stage, which determines the low success of therapy and low survival rates, and also actualizes the need to use effective methods (including morphological) for the diagnosis of LC in the early stages.
Due to the development of the minimally invasive vector of morphological diagnostics in recent decades, cytological examination of the material from the bronchopulmonary system is of leading importance, since it is characterized not only by low traumatism in obtaining cellular material, but also by high information content, cost-effectiveness, accessibility and speed of obtaining results. The effectiveness of cytological examination for the diagnosis of precancerous lesions and LC has been proven in numerous studies, and the importance and necessity of its use are reflected in the new edition of the WHO classification of tumors of thoracic localization (2021) and the WHO reporting system for lungs Cytopathology (2022).