[Expression of estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor, and human epithelial growth factor receptor 2 in breast cancer and the significance thereof: analysis of 910 cases].
OBJECTIVE
To investigate the expression of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR), and human epithelial growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) in breast cancer, and to explore their correlation with the age of patient, and size, clinic stage, and lymph node metastasis of the tumor.


METHODS
The data of 910 breast cancer, 89.4% of invasive ductal carcinoma, 1.7% of invasive lobular carcinoma, 44 cases 5% of ductal carcinoma in situ, and 4.9% of other pathologic types, 29.9% being less than 2 cm, 45.6% being 2-5 cm, and 24.5% bigger than 5 cm in size, 54.2% without metastasis in lymph node, 25.5% with metastasis in 1-3 lymph nodes, and 20.3% with metastasis in more than 3 lymph nodes respectively, were analyzed retrospectively. Immunohistochemistry was used to detect the expression of ER, PR, and HER2.


RESULTS
The ER negative expression rate was 33.0%, and PR negative expression rate was 27.4%, and HER2 overexpression rate was 20.3%. The possibility of lymph node metastasis decreased along with the increase of age (P < 0.001). Tumor size was negatively correlated with the expression of ER and PR (both P < 0.001), and positively correlated with the expression of HER2 (P < 0.001). There was no significant difference between the situation of lymph node metastasis and the expression of ER, PR and HER2 in primary tumors.


CONCLUSIONS
As good prognostic markers of breast invasive ductal cancer, ER and PR are negatively correlated with the HER2 expression, as a worse prognostic marker. ER/PR positive or HER2 negative tumors are morel likely to be diagnosed at earlier stages.
Liu
Ren-bin
RB
Department of Breast Surgery, First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China.
Zhou
Xing-hua
XH
Wang
Jia-ni
JN
Liang
Hui-zhen
HZ
Li
Xiao-xi
XX
Wu
Zhuang-hong
ZH
Ye
Jie-lian
JL
Wang
Shen-ming
SM
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000378:metabolism*; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology; D047628:Estrogen Receptor alpha / Q000378:metabolism*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D008207:Lymphatic Metastasis; D008875:Middle Aged; D009361:Neoplasm Invasiveness; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011379:Prognosis; D018719:Erb-b2 Receptor Tyrosine Kinases / Q000378:metabolism*; D011980:Receptors, Progesterone / Q000378:metabolism*; D012189:Retrospective Studies
D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D047628:Estrogen Receptor alpha; D018719:Erb-b2 Receptor Tyrosine Kinases; D011980:Receptors, Progesterone; C506487:ESR1 protein, human; C508053:ERBB2 protein, human