Serine Protease Granzyme H Isolated from Lymph Nodes of Breast Cancer Patient

Expression of epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase family in fine needle aspiration and permanent specimens of invasive lobular and ductal breast cancers

Recently, the role of HER-2/Neu gene amplification has been enthusiastically investigated in breast cancer. Determining the HER-2/Neu status could be achieved by evaluating either histologic samples or cytologic specimens obtained by Fine Needle Aspiration (FNA). This study aimed at determining the concordance of HER-2/Neu expression in FNA and histologic sections. FNA samples, as well as their corresponding histologic sections of 90 cases with breast cancer were evaluated in Tabriz Sina Teaching Center in a 13-month period of time. The immunohistochemistry was employed for determining the HER-2/Neu amplification for both methods. The concordance rate and agreement were determined between the two methods. Ninety specimens of women with a mean age of 50.93 +/- 10.64 (29-84) years were assessed. There were 84 cases with invasive ductal carcinoma and 6 cases with invasive lobular carcinoma. Lymph nodes were involved in 50 cases and there were vascular and neural involvement in 40 and 35 cases, respectively. Her-2/Neu was not detected in 27 cases (30%) with weak and strong amplifications in 47 (52.2%) and 16 (17.8%) cases of FNA specimens, respectively. Her-2/Neu was not detected in 29 cases (32.2%) with weak and strong amplifications in 42 (46.7%) and 19 (21.1%) cases of histologic specimens, respectively. The concordance rate was 70% between the two methods. The agree ment was statistically significant between the two methods, as well (kappa = 0.51, p < 0.001). HER-2/neu gene amplification can be reliably estimated by immunohistochemistry on breast cancer FNAs and a good correlation has been found between this and results on histological sections.