Karyoanomalic frequency assay during radiation therapy - A promising marker in the prognosis of oral and oropharyngeal carcinoma.

INTRODUCTION

Radiotherapy is commonly used in the treatment of oral and oropharyngeal carcinomas, either alone or in combination with other modalities of treatment like surgery/chemotherapy. It is always essential to know the nature of tumor response to the irradiation for successful outcomes and prognosis. With this view, the study has been conducted to document the usefulness of nuclear changes, karyolysis (KL), and karyorrhexis (KR) in particular as prognostic markers during the treatment.

MATERIALS AND METHOD

Sixty patients, aged between 28 and 73 years (56 males and 4 females) years, histopathologically confirmed cases of oral and oropharyngeal carcinoma of different degrees of differentiation, were included in the study. The mode of treatment for the patients was radiotherapy with a radiation dose plan of 4 Gy, 14 Gy, 24 Gy, and 60 Gy on the 2, 7, 12, 30 days, respectively. The mucosal scrapings obtained from the site of the lesion at each interval were stained with Giemsa and May-Grunwald's stain. The stained slides were studied to assess the frequency of KL and KR.

RESULTS

It was observed that there was no significant difference between the site of lesion and tumor differentiation with the frequency of KL or KR. However, there was a statistically significant difference in the KL and KR indices with each interval of treatment. The percentage of relative increment among both the studied parameters was also significant, indicating their efficiency as a promising prognostic marker in radiotherapy.

CONCLUSION

Hence, assessment of KL and KR at different intervals of time during radiotherapy could be used as an efficient tool to determine the radiosensitivity and prognosis in oral and oropharyngeal carcinoma patients.