BACKGROUND: The rapidly growing knowledge regarding factors controlling tumour growth, with the new modalities of therapy acting on the biological activity of the tumours draw the attention of most cancer researches nowadays and represent a major focus for clinical oncology practice. For the detection of HER2/neu protein overexpression and gene amplification, immunohistochemistry (IHC) and in-situ hybridisation (ISH) is the recommended techniques, respectively, with high concordance between the two techniques. The current United Kingdom recommendations for HER2/neu testing are either for a two-tier system using IHC with reflex ISH testing in equivocal positive cases, or a one-tier ISH strategy. AIM: To compare the results of HER2/neu gene status in patients with breast carcinoma obtained by chromogenic in situ hybridisation with those obtained by immunohistochemistry, and to compare these results with hormonal receptors expression by immunohistochemistry and with age of patients.METHODS: Immunohistochemistry technique was used for evaluation of status of estrogen receptors (ER) and progesterone receptors (PR) and HER2/neu protein expression in 448 Iraqi patients with invasive breast carcinoma with different grades and histological types and then chromogenic in situ hybridization (CISH) technique was applied for all scores of HER2/neu to detect the gene status and compare the results in all negative, equivocal and positive cases by immunohistochemistry (IHC). The cases were referred from different centres, and IHC and CISH techniques were done in central public health laboratory in Baghdad over 28 months, from July 2013 to November 2015. A comparison of the results was made to find the relationship between HER2/neu and hormone receptors status and other clinical parameters like patients age. RESULTS: The mean age of the study cases was 49.08 years, ranging from 24 to 83 years. Of the 448 cases of breast carcinoma, 44 (9.8%) cases were of score 0 by IHC, none of them (0%) showed HER2/neu gene amplification by CISH. 71(15.8%) cases were of score 1 by IHC, 15 (21.12%) of them showed HER2/neu gene amplification by CISH, all were of low amplification. There were 306 (68.3%) cases of score 2 by IHC, of which 102 (33.33%) cases showed HER2/neu gene amplification by CISH, with 79 (25.81%) of them with low amplification and 23 (7.51%) cases with high amplification, while only one case (0.32%) remained in equivocal category. In score 3, all the 27 (6.0%) cases showed gene amplification with 12 (44.44%) cases with low amplification and 15 (55.55) cases with high amplification with overall percentage of gene amplification in score 3 of 100%. There was a significant inverse relationship between hormone receptors (ER and PR) status and HER2/neu gene amplification. No significant relationship was found between the patient’s age and HER2/neu gene amplification.CONCLUSION: Although immunohistochemistry is a widely used, less expensive and reliable test, we strongly advice performance of chromogenic in situ hybridization in assessment of HER2/neu gene status in all cases diagnosed with breast carcinoma as significant number of cases that were reported as negative by immunohistochemistry showed positive amplification by chromogenic in situ hybridization and can get benefit from anti-HER2 targeted treatments.
Background: In Iraq, breast cancer is the most common type of malignancy among the Iraqi population in general. It accounts for approximately one third of the registered female cancers according to the latest Iraqi Cancer Registry.
Objectives: This study was conducted to assess the sociodemographic characteristics of patients with breast cancer in Baghdad.
Methodology: This cross sectional study that was conducted in Baghdad City during a three months period from January to March 2016. It was conducted at Al-Amal National Hospital for Cancer Management. The questionnaire form gathered info about sociodemographic characteristics including: age, gender, educational attainment, marital status, living arrangement, finical status, and d
Background: Breast cancer is the commonest cancer in women. In radiotherapy practice, it comprises 25% of patient caseload. This makes understanding the breast irradiation toxicities of prime importance. Early radiation toxicities occur during treatment and up to six months after treatment finished.
Objectives: assessment of the early side effects of adjuvant external beam radiotherapy (EBRT) in breast cancer patients.
Patients and Methods: A cross sectional survey with analytic component conducted on 60 patients treated in the oncology teaching hospital of medical city from January to April 2016.
Results: The most prevalent toxicities were radiation dermatitis, fatigue, pain, sore throat, nausea, dysphagia,&
Background: Bladder carcinoma is one of the most common cancer worldwide, it accounts for 6.5% of all cancers, with highest incidence in industrialized countries .It represents the fourth most common cancer in men and the eighth in women. Bladder carcinoma depends in its pathogenesis on a combination of genetic and environmental factors, these factors produce phenotypic changes that allow normal transitional cells to become cancerous and finally acquire the “malignant phenotype". Many attempts had been tried to explore the role of some genetic abnormalities encountered in bladder carcinoma. It has indicated that many genetic abnormalities may underline the pathogenesis of cancer evolution of urinary
... Show MoreBackground: Epithelial salivary gland tumours are relatively uncommon and constitute a wide spectrum of variable morphologic and biologic entities. The cell proliferation / death balance is most important in the development of salivary gland tumours. The aim of this study was to examine the expression of PCNA protein immunohistochemically and Bax mRNA gene using in situ hybridization techniques and to correlate between the clinicopathological features of salivary gland tumours with the expressions of PCNA protein and Bax mRNA. Materials and Methods: Forty nine formalin fixed paraffin embedded tissue blocks of epithelial salivary gland tumours were used in this study. Haematoxylin and Eosin stain was used for reassessment of the histopath
... Show MoreBreast cancer (BC) is the most prevalent tract cancer in the world, including Iraq. The classified breast tumors to benign, malignant, and radiotherapy. Cancer treatment depends on certain stages such as mastectomy then chemotherapy alone or with radiation therapy or endocrine therapy according to the prognostic features obtained from the pathology report. The present study included 100 females. The women were split into two groups, control group that consisted of 50 apparently healthy females and 50 patients with BC group who undergo the radiotherapy. The current study highlighted on some of the anthropometric measurements, including the oxidative stress index malondialdehyde (MDA), the concentrations of total antioxidant capacity (TAC), s
... Show MoreHuman Herpes Virus-8 (HHV-8) is a sexually transmitted viral infection that can infect the prostate epithelium in immunocompromised adults. Recently, HHV-8 was related to the development and progression of several human malignancies like prostatic adenocarcinoma. This retrospective research was designed to analyze the distribution and possible impact of HHV-8 infection on prostatic adenocarcinogenesis. A total number of one hundred formalin-fixed prostatic tissues were enrolled in this research; forty Prostate Adenocarcinoma (PAC) biopsies, forty biopsies from Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH), and twenty Apparently Normal Prostatic Tissues (ANPT) as a control group. Detection of HHV -8 DNA was achieved by a highly-sensitive variant of
... Show MoreObjectives: With the advent of ongoing novel modalities toward the treatment of human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)/NEU - positive malignancies, the serious side effects of chemoradiotherapy have been minimized. Hence, this study was conducted to identify the patterns of immunohistochemical expression of the promising therapeutic target (HER2/NEU) among Iraqi patients with medulloblastoma in an attempt to provide basic histological information’s that would help in future clinical researches.Materials and Methods: In this retrospective study, 42 formalin - fixed paraffin - embedded tissue blocks represent cases of surgically removed medulloblastomas were retrieved from the archived materials in a specialized surgical ho
... Show MoreThe current study was conducted in the period extending from November 2018 to October 2019 and designed as a case-control study and aimed to assess the seroprevalence of HCMV. However, a total number of 91serum specimens were collected to fulfill this purpose from females (71 breast cancer patients, and control group of 20 females) attending Al-Amal hospital for cancer management and Baghdad teaching hospital and the practical part was performed in College of Science, University of Baghdad. The study protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee at the Department of Biology (Reference: BEC/0220/0011). The immunological part for evaluation of seroprevalence of HCMV was accomplished by ELISA technique which revealed that anti-HCMV IgG was sco
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