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Association of c‐ erb B2‐gene amplification with poor prognosis in non‐inflammatory breast carcinomas but not in carcinomas of the inflammatory type
Author(s) -
Lě Monique G.,
DoucRasy Sétha,
Ahomadegbe Jean Charles,
Spielmann Marc,
Guérin Martine,
Riou Guy
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
international journal of cancer
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.475
H-Index - 234
eISSN - 1097-0215
pISSN - 0020-7136
DOI - 10.1002/ijc.2910580602
Subject(s) - medicine , inflammatory breast cancer , gene duplication , pathology , breast cancer , oncology , gene , biology , cancer research , cancer , genetics
It is now accepted that c‐ crb B2‐gene amplification is correlated with poor clinical outcome for patients, mainly when axillary nodes are invaded. We have confirmed this result by multivariate analysis in 178 patients with non‐inflammatory breast cancer followed up for a mean period of 6.8 years (SD, 1.6 years). In addition, we have shown that c‐ erb B2 amplification, found in 30 (17%) specimens, was associated with a high risk of multiple metastases developing simultaneously. In contrast, for the 67 patients with inflammatory breast carcinoma, the most aggressive type of breast carcinoma, the c‐ erb B2 amplification detected in 24 (36%) specimens was not found to be associated with a higher risk of death, suggesting that the oerbB2 gene plays a different role in the progression of these 2 types of breast cancer. Furthermore, our data stress the importance of the methodological approach used to determine gene amplification. Although Southern blot hybridization is a tumour‐ and time‐consuming method not easy to adopt in routine clinical practice, this method remains a reference quantitative method.