Invasive mammary carcinoma: assessment of HER-2/neu status by immunohistochemistry.

HER-2/neu oncoprotein overexpression in breast cancer patients has an impact on prognosis and treatment methods so assessment of its status is therefore much needed. The study group consisted of 90 cases of mammary invasive carcinoma. The distribution of HER-2/neu immunoexpression for scores 0, 1+, 2+ and 3+ were 54.44%, 11.11%, 18.8% and 15.56% respectively. HER-2/neu -positive cases comprised 21.42% of patients less than 50-year-old compared to 14.47% of patients of 50-year-old or older. Tumor size was negative correlated with HER-2/neu immunoexpression: positive tumors comprised 37.5% of tumor larger than 5 cm and this percentage decreases with tumor dimension to 2.94% in tumors of 2 cm or less. Regarding the histopathological subtype of invasive mammary carcinoma, only some types were positive, like 17.57% of IDC NOS and one case of mixed ductal-lobular invasive carcinoma. The highest proportion (21.31%) of positive HER-2/neu cases presented high-grade carcinomas (GIII), comparing with well-differentiated (GI) that were all negative. Regarding the axillary lymph node status the lowest proportion of positive HER-2/neu cases was 4.54% in the absence of metastasis, and rises to 34.78% in cases with more than three axillary lymph nodes involved. HER-2/neu-positive tumors showed a low incidence of ER+ or PR+ cases unlike HER-2/neu -negative cases (35.71% vs. 83.05% for ER, respective 21.42% vs. 76.27% for PR). Therefore, in conclusion, HER-2/neu-positive tumors are significantly fewer than the negative ones, but these are found in younger women and are associated with: large tumor size, high grade of malignancy (GIII) and increased number of axillary lymph node involvement. HER-2/neu immunoexpression is related to histological subtype of invasive breast carcinomas. Hormonal status is negative related to HER-2/neu expression.

The evaluation of the immunoexpression of Her2÷neu oncoprotein in ductal carcinoma in situ in association with invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast.

The identification of breast ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) is a factor that increases 8-10 times the risk of developing invasive ductal breast carcinoma (DCI) later. In this study, we evaluated the immunoexpression of the HER2/neu oncoprotein in the DCIS cases associated with DCI, both in situ and in the invasive components. We also studied the Her2/neu immunoreactivity in the cases of DCI having no DCIS association. The positive immunoreactivity (score 3) of the HER2/neu oncoprotein was present in 29 cases of high-grade DCIS having DCI associated, corresponding to the histological types comedo, solid, comedo/solid, and micropapillary. A weak-to-moderate complete membrane staining (score 2+) was determined in five high-grade DCIS and four intermediate-grade DCIS cases, belonging to the types comedo, solid, and micropapillary. The negative immunoreactivity of HER2/neu was identified in 18 cases, most of them being of low grade and belonging to the solid and cribriform types. The invasive component of the analyzed lesions indicated a HER2/neu positive reaction in 50% of lesions having DCI associated and 17.4% of the lesions having no DCIS association. The DCIS-DCI association and the DCIS histological types that were analyzed through the HER2/immunoexpression can stand as prognostic factors for the malignant breast lesions.

Cytological and histopathological aspects concerning preinvasive squamous cervical lesions.

Our study was carried out on a total number of 158 patients, with a mean age of 32, all tested and identified cytologically (Pap-test) as presenting minor cellular abnormalities, respectively ASCUS (10) and LSIL (119), and major cellular abnormalities, respectively SIL-borderline (8) and HSIL (21), and who, either voluntarily or upon cytopathologists' recommendation, were colposcopically examined. Subsequently, they were subjected to cervical biopsy or excision therapy. In patients with ASCUS cytology, 6 cases were morphologically diagnosed with benign cervical lesions, 3 were diagnosed with LSIL, and one patient was diagnosed as HSIL (CIN 2). Out of 119 LSIL smears 108 were confirmed by histopathology, while 11 were diagnosed as HSIL (CIN 2). In SIL-borderline patients, 5 cases were screened as LSIL and 3 as HSIL. In patients with HSIL cytology, 18 were diagnosed histopathologically as HSIL (CIN 2 and CIN 3/CIS), while 3 were diagnosed as invasive squamous carcinoma.