Frequency of overexpression of Her2/neu in colorectal adenocarcinomas– A hospital based cross-sectional study

Colorectal malignancies stand out to be one of the chief causes of morbidity and mortalityin the world. Although the total incidence of colorectal malignancy in India n population has marginallyincreased, it is now a common cause of cancer mortality among Indians.The oncogene HER2/neu belongs to the tyrosine kinase receptor family. The favorable outcome ofHER2/neu in management of breast carcinoma patients has direct ed to evaluation of gene amplificationprotein overexpression, and anti-tumor activity of Herceptin in various tumor types one amongst whichis colorectal carcinomas. The objective of the study was to evaluate the frequency of overexpression ofHER2/neu in colorectal adenocarcinomas (CRC) and its association with various histomorphological andclinicopathological parameters.Materials and Methods: A total of 52 cases of colorectal adenocarcinomas including colonoscopicbiopsies & resected specimens were studied. Paraffin embedded sections were stained with Hematoxylin &Eosin and histological and clinicopathological parameters were assessed. In IHC, antigens were retrievedby Heat Induced Epitope Retrieval method and HER2/ neu status was determined using a semiquantitativescoring system. The scores were then correlated with histological grade, type and clinicopathologicalparameters.Results: The HER2/neu overexpression was noted in 53.8% of our cases and was seen to be commonlyexpressed by moderately differentiated tumours and conventional/ NOS histological type.There was a statistically significant correlation observed between HER2/neu status and tumour grade (p=0.001), tumour type (p = 0.008). There was no significant correlation between age, gender or localisationor stage of tumour.Conclusion: Histological grade and histological type of CRC showed a significant correlation withHER2/neu overexpression, hence can be used as a predictive tool for determining the prognosis of thepatients.Patients who overexpress HER2/neu could