[GUIDELINES FOR DIAGNOSIS AND TREATMENT OF PATIENTS WITH MYELODYSPLASTIC SYNDROME].

Myelodysplastic syndrome Working Group of the Croatian Cooperative Group for Hematologic Diseases (CROHEM), Referral center of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Croatia for diagnostics and treatment of MDS, as well as the Croatian Society for Haematology of the Croatian Medical Association have made Croatian guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS). MDS is a heterogeneous group of clonal hematopoietic stem cell disorders characterized by ineffective hematopoiesis, dysplasia, cytopenia and risk of transformation to acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Diagnosis is based on morphological characteristics of hematopoietic cells supplemented with the cytogenetic analysis and bone marrow flow cytometry.

Fine-needle aspiration cytology yield as a basis for morphological, molecular, and cytogenetic diagnosis in alk-positive anaplastic large cell lymphoma with atypical clinical presentation.

ALK positive anaplastic large cell lymphoma is a T-cell lymphoma usually occurring in children and young adults. It frequently involves lymph nodes and extranodal sites and is associated with favorable prognosis. A 20-year old man was admitted for painful mass in the left axilla with overlying skin redness.

Hydronephrotic Kidney Previously Treated for Tuberculosis: Rare Primary Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Renal Pelvis Diagnosed by Fine-needle Aspiration Cytology.

Primary squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the renal pelvis is a very rare tumor often associated with renal calculi and chronic infections. There are only a few articles in literature which report renal pelvis SCC in kidneys treated for renal tuberculosis, diagnosed after nephrectomy. We report the case of SCC in a hydronephrotic kidney previously treated for tuberculosis, diagnosed by ultrasound (US)-guided fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC), prior to core biopsy and nephrectomy.

Clinical cytology and primary health care of children and adults.

Clinical cytology is a diagnostic branch of medicine, best known by the Papa test in gynaecology. But, cytology can be applied in almost all fields of clinical medicine. Its advantages--high accuracy, simplicity, with little or no aggressiveness and low cost--are not used as widely as they could be.

Fine-needle aspiration cytology of apocrine hidradenoma.

An apocrine hidradenoma is a benign adnexal neoplasm, usually covered by intact skin, but may show superficial ulceration and serous discharge. This feature is raising the possibility of malignancy as it was in our case of macroscopically suspicious tumour. We described cytomorphologic features of cutaneous nodule that might be a lead to the cytologic diagnosis of hidradenoma, but primary or secondary malignant tumour has been ruled out first.

Intraoperative imprint cytological assessment of the subareolar tissue of the nipple areola complex (NAC).

One of the criteria of selection for skin sparing mastectomy (SSM) with nipple areola complex (NAC) preservation is to exclude the neoplastic involvement of subareolar tissue (NAC base) in order to minimize the possibility of local recurrence. The most common way to assess the possible neoplastic involvement is intraoperative frozen section of the NAC base tissue. Because of its limitations, particularly the false negative results due to unsampling, we tried to use intraoperative imprint cytology for more thorough intraoperative assessment.

Flow cytometric analysis of deep-seated lymph nodes.

Flow cytometry (FC) immunophenotyping is an important tool in the evaluation of lymphadenopathy and is widely used in the diagnosis of non-Hodgkin's lymphomas (NHLs) on fine-needle aspirates of lymph nodes and extranodal sites. Because at least 80% of NHLs are of B-cell type, detection of immunoglobulin (Ig) light-chain-restriction is the most commonly used method for confirmation of monoclonality. The aim of our study was to evaluate usefulness of endoscopic ultrasound-guided fine needle aspiration (EUS-FNA) for FC analysis from deep-seated lymph nodes and to compare results of FC clonality analysis to cytomorphologic diagnosis of sampled lymph nodes.

Misleading presentations of malignant breast diseases--role of clinical cytology.

We described two examples with misleading presentations to draw attention to the role of clinical cytology as apart of multidisciplinary approach to breast lesions. In the first case--Paget's disease of the nipple, there was no obvious clinical and radiological evidence of breast cancer, while the second case--primary non-Hodgkin lymphoma of the breast imitated advanced breast carcinoma. The question is whether accurate and fast diagnoses can be made without cytological examinations.

The importance of urgent cytological examination of synovial fluids in differentiation inflammatory and non-inflammatory joint diseases.

The aim of this study was to imply the possibilities of the urgent cytological examination of synovial fluids in differential diagnosis of arthropathies and to motivate the clinicians to use this method. It gave valuable information particularly with respect to differentiate the inflammatory and non-inflammatory joint diseases. This study included 115 synovial fluids obtained by fine needle aspiration (FNA) of the swollen knee from the patients in the period between 2003 and 2008.

Biliary brush cytology for the diagnosis of malignancy: a single center experience.

Differentiation between benign and malignant biliary strictures is critical to the provision of adequate treatment. Brush cytology during the endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) is the most commonly used method for obtaining tissue confirmation of the nature of biliary strictures. It's specificity is remarkably high but reported sensitivities for the diagnosis of malignancy are low.

The accuracy of fine needle aspiration cytology and flow cytometry in evaluation of nodal and extranodal sites in patients with suspicion of lymphoma.

Today lymphomas are defined according to a combination of morphology, immunophenotype, genetic features and clinical presentation, so beside the pure cytomorphologic analysis in diagnosis of lymphoma ancillary techniques such as cytochemistry, immunocytochemistry, molecular diagnosis and flow cytometry (FC) are often used. Our goal was to determinate how is information given by fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) and FC correlated with pathohistologic diagnosis and to evaluate ability to diagnose and subclassify malignant lymphomas by FNAC and FC. This study is a retrospective chart review of patients with suspicion of lymphoma processed at University Hospital Dubrava in Zagreb.

Alpha-methylacyl-CoA racemase (AMACR) in fine-needle aspiration specimens of prostate lesions.

The elevated expression of P504S gene and its product alpha-methylacyl-CoA racemase (AMACR) can serve as a molecular marker for prostate cancer. The goal of this study is to investigate P504S/AMACR expression in fine-needle aspiration smears and correlate it with cytological diagnosis. Immunocytochemistry was performed in 35 patients with morphological diagnosis of prostate carcinoma (n = 16), atypia (n = 15), and benign hyperplasia (n = 4).