Troncone G, Panico L, Vetrani A, de Divitiis B, Zeppa P, Fulciniti F, Pettinato G, Palombini L
Laboratory and Cytopathology Service, Faculty of Medicine and Surgery, University of Naples Federico II, Italy.
Diagn Cytopathol. 1996 Mar;14(2):135-9. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1097-0339(199603)14:2<135::AID-DC6>3.0.CO;2-I.
Most of the data regarding the significance of c-erbB-2 oncogene expression as a prognostic marker in breast cancer have been generated in many large retrospective studies by retrieving the corresponding oncoprotein in archival paraffin embedded sections. Recently, employing fresh breast cancer cells obtained by means of fine-needle aspiration biopsy, we found a rate of c-erbB-2 positive breast tumors (58%) higher than that reported in paraffin-embedded tissue sections by others studies. The present analysis was undertaken to investigate the impact of routine tissue processing on the preservation of the c-erbB-2 immunoreactivity. This issue was addressed by assessing the relative rate of c-erbB-2 oncoprotein immunodetection on FNAB smears and matched surgical specimens of breast cancer. The expression of c-erbB-2 oncoprotein was evaluated using the alkaline phosphate-anti-alkaline phosphatase (APAAP) technique in 54 breast aspirates and corresponding surgical specimens of primary breast cancer. Twenty-six (48%) smears and 23 (43%) matched paraffin sections gave specific signal for c-erbB-2 oncoprotein. The slightly higher incidence of c-erbB-2 expression found on smears seems to be mainly due to the better antigen preservation in the fresh cytological preparations. We conclude that routine histological processing may affect c-erbB-2 immunoreactivity; therefore, in mounting prospective studies, it is advisable to assess c-erbB-2 status in fresh tissue. Moreover, the assessment of c-erbB-2 expression on aspirate samples may yield additional information to the pre-surgical prognostic evaluation of breast cancer diagnosed by FNAB.
关于c-erbB-2癌基因表达作为乳腺癌预后标志物的意义，大部分数据是通过在存档石蜡包埋切片中检索相应的癌蛋白，在许多大型回顾性研究中得出的。最近，我们采用细针穿刺活检获得的新鲜乳腺癌细胞，发现c-erbB-2阳性乳腺肿瘤的比例（58%）高于其他研究报道的石蜡包埋组织切片中的比例。本分析旨在研究常规组织处理对c-erbB-2免疫反应性保存的影响。通过评估细针穿刺抽吸涂片（FNAB）和匹配的乳腺癌手术标本上c-erbB-2癌蛋白免疫检测的相对比例来解决这个问题。使用碱性磷酸酶-抗碱性磷酸酶（APAAP）技术对54例乳腺穿刺物和相应的原发性乳腺癌手术标本评估c-erbB-2癌蛋白的表达。26份（48%）涂片和23份（43%）匹配的石蜡切片对c-erbB-2癌蛋白给出了特异性信号。在涂片上发现的c-erbB-2表达略高的发生率似乎主要是由于新鲜细胞学制剂中更好的抗原保存。我们得出结论，常规组织学处理可能会影响c-erbB-2免疫反应性；因此，在开展前瞻性研究时，建议在新鲜组织中评估c-erbB-2状态。此外，对穿刺物样本上c-erbB-2表达的评估可能会为通过FNAB诊断的乳腺癌的术前预后评估提供额外信息。
