Flow cytometric cell cycle kinetics and quantitative measurement of c-erbB-2 and mutant p53 proteins in normal, hyperplastic, and malignant endometrial biopsies.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study is to biologically characterize endometrial hyperplasia by investigating changes in DNA ploidy pattern, the expression of c-erbB-2 p185 and mutant p53 proteins.


RESULTS
Our results show that all normal endometria (n = 62) were exclusively diploid and 2 (2.5%) of 79 endometrial hyperplasias and 22 (68.8%) of 32 endometrial carcinomas were aneuploid. Upper 95% normal values for synthetic phase fraction (SPF), c-erbB-2 and p53 were applied as cut-off values to discriminate between normal and malignant endometria. When 9%, 3.2 HNU (Human Neu Unit)/microgram protein, and 0.39 ng/mg protein were used as cut-off values for SPF. c-erbB-2, and p53 respectively, 13.9%, 20.2%, and 0% of endometrial hyperplasia and 50%, 56.3%, and 12.5% of endometrial carcinoma showed raised levels of the corresponding parameters.


CONCLUSIONS
Our results indicate that subsets of endometrial hyperplasia are biologically different as evidenced by the presence of DNA aneuploidy, high SPF and c-erbB-2 overexpression, which may provide biological markers for assessing progression to endometrial carcinoma.
Eissa
S
S
Biochemistry Department, Ain Shams Faculty of Medicine, Cairo, Egypt.
Abu Saada
M
M
el-Sharkawy
T
T
D000328:Adult; D001706:Biopsy; D002453:Cell Cycle; D004714:Endometrial Hyperplasia / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology; D016889:Endometrial Neoplasms / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000473:pathology; D004717:Endometrium / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D017698:Postmenopause; D017697:Premenopause; D018719:Erb-b2 Receptor Tyrosine Kinases / Q000032:analysis*; D016159:Tumor Suppressor Protein p53 / Q000032:analysis* / Q000235:genetics
D018719:Erb-b2 Receptor Tyrosine Kinases; D016159:Tumor Suppressor Protein p53