[Radiation-borne changes to vaginal and portio epithelium (author's transl)].

Radiotherapy of cervix carcinoma may cause radiation-borne reactive cell changes to epithelial cells of the vagina and portio which are sizeable but harmless. However, postradiation dysplasia with damage to the DNA and RNA is a genuine dysplasia and may be a precancerous condition. It is cytologically characterised by impairment of the nucleocytoplasmatic ratio as well as by hyperchromia and heterochromia of nuclei. Statistically secured correlation with recurrent carcinomas was established only for severe types with aneuploid DNA in the nuclei.