Detection of Mast Cells in the Vicinity of Peritumoral Stroma of Invasive Breast Carcinoma
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- Category: Vol. 80, June 2012
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Detection of Mast Cells in the Vicinity of Peritumoral Stroma of Invasive Breast Carcinoma,ABDALLAH M. KHALIL, ESSAM E. AYAD, SAMAR A. EL-SHEIKH and LUBNA O. EL FAROUK ABDEL SALAM
Abstract
Breast cancer is the most common malignancy among women worldwide with increasing incidence rates. The role of the immune system during cancer development is complex. The role of mast cells in cancer progression is still a matter of debate, as their accumulation has been associated with enhanced growth and invasion in some human cancers, and on the other hand, mast cell infiltration has been associated with good prognosis in others. This work aimed at detecting the relation between the presence of mast cells in the peritu-moral stroma and other clinicopathological features, in order to identify their role as a prognostic factor in cancer breast progression. To perform this study, we collected archival blocks prepared from 40 cases of modified radical mastectomy and quadrentectomy with axillary clearance specimens diag-nosed as breast carcinoma (33 invasive duct NOS, five cases of lobular carcinoma and two cases of medullary carcinoma). Cases other than invasive duct carcinoma NOS (7/40) were grouped together under the category of (others) for statistical purposes. c-kit immunohistochemical staining was evaluated in the peritumoral stroma as well as in the tumor cells. Toluidine blue stain was done to delineate stromal mast cells from singly present c-kit positive tumor cells in the stroma. This study has found no statistical correlation between mast cells and other clinicopathological variables present in cancer breast cases included like age, histological type, tumor grade, tumoral necrosis, nodal status as well as c-kit expression in tumor cells. In conclusion, these findings suggest that the role of mast cells in breast cancer is still controversial and more studies on a wider scale of patients are recommended.