Predictive value of lectin binding on breast-cancer recurrence and survival.

A new approach for predicting long-term survival of breast-cancer patients is the detection of carbohydrate expression in paraffin-embedded sections of the primary tumour. The binding of a lectin (HPA), derived from the albumin gland of the Roman snail, Helix pomatia, to N-acetyl-galactosaminyl oligosaccharides appears valuable in assessing long-term prognosis. The clinical progress of 179 patients, followed-up for 15-20 years, was related to staining of paraffin sections of their primary breast cancers by HPA. All patients had had mastectomy but were not stratified by pathology or treatment. There were significant differences, in premenopausal patients, between groups with and without HPA staining in both time to first recurrence and survival time. HPA binding provides an extra tool for staging to aid decisions in early adjuvant treatment, with the advantage of being applicable to routinely fixed paraffin-embedded material.