Abstract
Breast cancer is a heterogeneous hormone-dependent disease. Potential prognosis depends on the clinicopathological evaluation and assessment of other prognostic indicators. The detection of the oestrogen Receptor (ER), Progesterone Receptor (PR), Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (Her2/neu) and BRCA1 oncoprotein is pivotal for prognostic evaluation and to choose the appropriate post-surgical adjuvant therapy beside selecting the proper candidate for genetic counselling. Objectives:To detect the immunoexpression of the BRCA1 oncoprotein in mammary invasive ducal carcinoma and its association with the prognostic markers (ER, PR and Her2/neu hormonal receptors) and other clinicopathological parameters to improve the patients’ treatment plans. Methods:A cross-sectional study design including 83 paraffin blocks and histological slides collected from Al-Jumhoori Medical City Teaching Hospital Laboratory in Mosul and the Central Public Health Laboratory in Baghdad between the 1st of January 2010 to the 13th of March 2012 for patients diagnosed with primary invasive ductal breast carcinomas. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) using monoclonal antibodies against ER, PR, Her2/neu receptors and BRCA1 protein was performed via the fully automated immunostaining instrument ‘Ventana Benchmark’. Results:BRCA1 protein immunoexpression was detected in 20.5% of cases. It was significantly high with increasing tumour grade and stage. Although there was a trend of BRCA1 negativity toward negative ER, PR and Her2 receptors, no significant associations were observed with any of these parameters and the patients’ age. Conclusion:Altered BRCA1 expression is significantly associated with advanced tumour grade and stage. High number of cases with negative BRCA1 expression showed negative ER, PR and Her2/neu expression.
Highlights
Breast cancer (BC) is one of the most common cancers worldwide and is the second leading cause of death among females in the United States (NBCF, 2018)
The peak age of breast cancer susceptibility type 1 (BRCA1) negative patients was in the fourth decade, no significant correlation found between BRCA1 expression and different age groups (Table 1)
A significant relation between BRCA1 expression and advanced tumour stage was found which coincides with the reports from other researches (Bugrein and Bujassoum, 2016; Ashraf et al, 2011)
Summary
Breast cancer (BC) is one of the most common cancers worldwide and is the second leading cause of death among females in the United States (NBCF, 2018). In order to decide adjuvant therapies to improve the patients’ prognosis and survival rates, a thorough assessment of the clinicopathological state, hormonal testing for (oestrogen, progesterone and Her2/neu) receptors in addition to genetic receptors like BRCA1 and BRCA2 are needed. This can be attributed to the fact that 80% of women with familial tendency to breast and/or ovarian cancer harbour these highly penetrating mutated genes (Shulman, 2010). The acronym (BRCA) type 1 or 2 stands for breast cancer susceptibility type 1 (BRCA1) and type (BRCA2) which are considered as tumour suppressor genes mapped on chromosome 17q21 and 13q12 respectively (Ripperger et al, 2009). To the best of our knowledge, limited studies were performed on BRCA immunoexpression and hormone receptor status in our locality, this research was performed to check BRCA1 immunoexpression and its association with ER, Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention, Vol 21 1025
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