Clinical and histopathological features and immunoreactivity of human choroidal and ciliary melanomas as prognostic factors for metastasis and death.

Purposes: To determine the relationship between immunohistochemical reactivity to osteopontin, vimentin, keratin 8/18, LZTS1, and beta-catenin and clinical and histopathological prognostic factors for metastasis and death in archival specimens of primary uveal melanomas, and the prognostic value of the evaluated study variables for death from metastasis.

Methods: Retrospective analysis of clinical records and formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded slides of primary uveal melanomas treated by enucleation during May 1 1999, through June 30 2009. Immunofluorescent staining of each tumor was assessed on newly prepared histologic slides after the application of antibodies directed against five biomarkers associated with unfavorable prognosis in uveal melanoma.

Medulloepithelioma of the optic disc.

A 6-year-old boy with a history of an amblyopic, occasionally red left eye was found to have a solid white mass overlying the optic disc on dilated ocular fundus examination. Transvitreal endoincisional biopsy of the mass yielded neoplastic tissue consistent with intraocular medulloepithelioma. The eye was removed subsequently because of concern that the tumor may invade the retrobulbar optic nerve.