Relationship between DNA content and lung cancer

Abstract

Objective To study the value of DNA content in the diagnosis of lung cancer. Methods DNA index(DI), the rate of heteroploid(RH) and proliferation index(PI) were determined by flow cytometry in 35 lung cancer specimens and 14 matched benign specimens,and analyzed with histological tumor type, differentiation and tumor stage. Results ①Among 35 lung cancer patients,29 cases were found aneuploidy and 4 cases were determined muhiploid. Aneuploidy pattern was much higher in Iung cancer group (83 %)than that in control group (14 %). Analysing of DNA content as one of diagnostic method in the study,sensitivity and specificity could reach 83 % and 90 %, respectively. There was statistical difference on DI, RH and PI between lung cancer group and control group.②Compared with diploidy lung cancer patients, DI was much higher in aneuploidy lung cancer patients. However, there was no significant difference on PI. ③The results showed that DI,RH and PI were not correlated with histologic type, tumor stage,differentiation and lymph node metastasis in lung cancer. Conclusions Determination of DNA content by flow cytometry can be used as valuable method in diagnosis of lung cancer due to its high sensitivity and specificity. Flow cytometry can only determine total quantity of patients genetic material, but it fails to discriminate different histologic type, tumor stage, differentiation and lymph node metastasis in lung cancer. Key words: DNA content,Lung cancer