Prevalence of known prognostic factors in female breast carcinoma including oestrogen receptor, progesterone receptor and Her-2/neu status--a study in a tertiary care centre.

Breast cancer is second most common cancer in Indian women. It is often curable by various treatment modalities when detected in early stage. Prognosis and selection of therapy in breast cancer depends upon various factors including clinical parameters, histopathological subtype and molecular characteristics of primary tumour. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of different prognostics factors including immunohistochemical marker ie, oestrogen receptor, progesterone receptor and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (Her-2/neu) status in female breast carcinoma in a tertiary care centre. In this study 80 females patients who were found to have carcinoma of breast by fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) and consequently confirmed by histopathology were followed up for one year. Immunohistochemical staining for molecular markers like oestrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR) and Her-2/neu were done in selected 48 cases. Various clinical parameters, cytopathological and hispathological findings as well as immunohistochemical studies were correlated to know the prevalence of these important prognostic factors. It was found that majority of patients were under 50 years of age group with high parity status. Significant patients had breast lump > 4 cm in size. Infiltrating duct carcinoma not otherwise specified (NOS) was the most common histological type showing predominantly microscopic grade II as per Nottingham's Modification of Bloom Richardson grading system. Immunohistochemistry showed 75% ER positivity, 66.66% PR positivity and 25% Her-2/neu positivity.