The many faces of triple negative breast cancer

Triple negative breast tumors are described by the lack of immunohistochemical expression for hormone receptors (ER and PgR) and Her2 neu. The immunophenotype is, in general,associated with young age and high biological aggressiveness,its frequency in the literature ranging from 10 to 20%. In our study we performed a retrospective classification of triple negative breast cancers in order to show the large spectrum of lesions that can embrace this very special phenotype.Clinicopathological parameters evaluated included age, tumorsize and macroscopic appearance, histological subtype and association with in situ component, the degree of tumor differentiation (nuclear pleomorphism, mitosis count, the formation of tubules), presence of lymph nodes or distant metastases. Triple negative breast cancers represent a particular subtype of tumors but their, now famous, aggressiveness applies only to some histological subtypes. It is very important to correlate the histological features and the phenotypical expression.

Biological prognostic parameters in gastric carcinomas

Gastric cancer is the second leading cause of cancer mortality worldwide. (1) Gastric carcinogenesis involves a variety of factors including diet, habitual factors as well as environmental factors. (2,3) This study aimed to correlate clinicopathological parameters of the cases studied and PCNA and p53 expression using immunohistochemistry. The study group included a total of 32 patients that underwent gastrectomy for gastric cancer.The study parameters were represented by epidemiological aspects (age, sex), clinical characteristics (signs and symptoms),histopathological findings (pTNM staging and degree of differentiation, histological classification, lymph nodes status and presence of vascular invasion) and survival, and immunohistochemical analysis (p53 and PCNA expression) of the study group. Histopathological study showed that most of the cases(26 cases) were of the intestinal type and 6 cases of the diffuse type. Immunohistochemical analysis of p53 protein expression showed an average of 20.75% positive cells, while PCNA expression showed an average of 47.3%. In terms of survival there were 6 cases of death at intervals ranged from 2-189 days,5 cases had subsequent presentations over 12 months, while 8 patients were lost to follow-up. At the time of surgery, 6 patients had distant metastases, while 6 more developed them in a period of 2-12 months after surgery. Identification of biomolecules that highlight potentially aggressive tumors may help modulate the therapeutic approach after surgical resection.

Evaluating the treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer with monoclonal antibodies

The ability to tailor biologic therapy based on the status of tumor biomarkers and monoclonal antibodies has become very important in the last years. The role of tumor biomarkers in treating colorectal cancer, specifically the K-RAS gene, was identified. K-RAS had a higher interest after Lievre and colleagues reported at the 2008 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting, their analysis of K-RAS mutations in tumors from patients who did not appear to benefit from cetuximab therapy, providing additional data involving K-RAS mutant tumors and their lack of response to cetuximab, as part of first-line therapy for metastatic colorectal cancer. Furthermore, other trials evaluated the K-RAS status and the first-line treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer, the treatment of refractory metastatic cancer and dual-antibody therapy in the first-line treatment of colorectal cancer. Patients with mutant K-RAS colorectal tumors have no benefit from cetuximab, no matter the type of chemotherapy regimen.