Histological grading of breast cancer; significance of grade on recurrence and mortality.

The influence of histological grade on the recurrence and mortality of patients with breast cancer is reported for 829 patients. The effect of the histological grade is also compared with the effect of axillary node involvement and the implications for clinical studies of the management of breast cancer discussed. The prognosis for both recurrence and death becomes increasingly poor as the degree of differentiation decreases, as reflected by the grading allocated to the tumour.

Observer variation in histological grading of breast cancer.

A multicentre study was conducted to assess the degree of agreement between pathologists grading breast tumours using the WHO criteria. Satisfactory correlation of grades was found to occur with observer variation of 21.9% on 874 tumours.

The diagnosis of acute gallbladder disease by technetium-99m-labelled HIDA hepatobiliary scanning.

A series of 105 patients with upper abdominal pain suggestive of biliary colic who had hepatobiliary scans within 48 h of admission to hospital is presented. Fifty of the 65 patients with abnormal scans had operative treatment and gallbladder pathology was found in every case. Fourteen of these patients had hepatobiliary scans which also showed delayed excretion of tracer into the duodenum, and of these, 12 were found to have common bile duct stones and one a stricture of the distal end of the common bile duct.

Prophylactic use of metronidazole in preventing wound sepsis after elective cholecystectomy.

The effect of intravenous metronidazole as prophylaxis against postoperative wound infection was studied in a prospective, randomized, double-blind controlled trial of 116 patients undergoing elective cholecystectomy. No significant difference was found in the infection rate between the treated and the control groups.