Educational Case: Giant Cell Tumor of the Bone in Both the Axial and Appendicular Skeleton.

http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.

Perspectives on Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Current Treatment Strategies, Unmet Needs, and Potential Targets for Future Therapies.

Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), characterized by the absence or low expression of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR), and human epidermal growth factor receptor (HER2), is the most aggressive subtype of breast cancer. TNBC accounts for about 15% of breast cancer cases in the U.S.

Unmet Clinical Need: Developing Prognostic Biomarkers and Precision Medicine to Forecast Early Tumor Relapse, Detect Chemo-Resistance and Improve Overall Survival in High-Risk Breast Cancer.

Chemo-resistant breast cancer is a major barrier to curative treatment for a significant number of women with breast cancer. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) is standard first- line treatment for most women diagnosed with high-risk TNBC, HER2+, and locally advanced ER+ breast cancer. Current clinical prognostic tools evaluate four clinicopathological factors: Tumor size, LN status, pathological stage, and tumor molecular subtype.

RAS pathway biomarkers for breast cancer prognosis.

Metastatic breast cancer is a highly heterogeneous, rapidly evolving and devastating disease that challenges our ability to find curative therapies. RAS pathway activation is an understudied research area in breast cancer. EGFR/RAS pathway activation is prevalent in breast cancer with poor prognosis.

SIAH and EGFR, Two RAS Pathway Biomarkers, are Highly Prognostic in Locally Advanced and Metastatic Breast Cancer.

Background: Metastatic breast cancer exhibits diverse and rapidly evolving intra- and inter-tumor heterogeneity. Patients with similar clinical presentations often display distinct tumor responses to standard of care (SOC) therapies. Genome landscape studies indicate that EGFR/HER2/RAS "pathway" activation is highly prevalent in malignant breast cancers.

Prostate-derived Ets transcription factor (PDEF) downregulates survivin expression and inhibits breast cancer cell growth in vitro and xenograft tumor formation in vivo.

Previous studies using immunohistochemistry suggest that loss of the expression of the prostate-derived Ets transcription factor (PDEF) is a strong indicator for cancer cell malignancy. However, the underlying mechanism for this has not been well elucidated. We determined the role of PDEF in breast cancer cell growth and tumor formation using a series of experiments including Western blotting, promoter-luciferase reporter assay, RNA interference technology and a mouse xenograft model.

Genomic instability in invasive breast carcinoma measured by inter-Simple Sequence Repeat PCR.

We have measured genomic instability in invasive breast carcinomas and assessed the relationship of genomic instability to known tumor prognostic factors. DNAs from tumors and adjacent normal tissue of 18 breast cancer patients were subjected to inter-Simple Sequence Repeat (inter-SSR) PCR for quantitation of tumor genomic instability. Associations between genomic instability level and known breast cancer prognostic factors were evaluated using the Pearson Product Moment Correlation, the Kruskal-Wallis test of independent samples and the Mann-Whitney non-parametric test.

HER-2/neu evaluation in breast cancer are we there yet?

The HER-2/neu oncogene is located on chromosome 17q and encodes a transmembrane glycoprotein with intracellular tyrosine kinase activity. Several studies have shown an association of HER-2 gene amplification or protein overexpression with prognosis and predictor of therapeutic response. Most important, the presence of amplification or overexpression is the basis of eligibility for trastuzumab therapy.

Microtome shaving radiography: demonstration of loss of mammographic microcalcifications during histologic sectioning.

Mammographic-pathologic correlation of suspicious microcalcifications is essential for optimal diagnosis and local staging of early breast carcinoma. Loss of microcalcifications during histologic sectioning has been suggested as one reason for the occasional lack of microscopic visualization of microcalcifications in routinely processed breast biopsy specimens obtained for suspicious mammographic microcalcifications. Two case reports utilizing radiography of histologic shavings of stereotactic core biopsies and surgical excisional biopsies of mammographic microcalcifications provide concrete evidence of the loss of large calcific particles during the microtome process.

Papillary thyroid cancer: high inter-(simple sequence repeat) genomic instability in a typically indolent cancer.

Objectives: The object of this study is to measure genomic instability in papillary thyroid cancer and correlate these measurements with known clinical prognosticators such as patient age, tumor size, histologic subtype, and three commonly used thyroid risk assessment indices. A secondary objective of this study was to use the measurements of genomic instability to estimate the number of mutational events present in the papillary thyroid cancer genome.

Methods: Inter-simple sequence repeat polymerase chain reaction (ISSR-PCR) is a rapid and reproducible technique for quantitation of genomic instability, or the degree of genome alteration, in solid tumors.

Effect of stereotactic core needle biopsy on pathologic measurement of tumor size of T1 invasive breast carcinomas presenting as mammographic masses.

Background: Stereotactic core needle biopsy (SCNB) may change the size of the tumor defined pathologically at excision. This may alter tumor stage and affect recommendations for adjuvant systemic therapy. This study evaluated the effect of SCNB on assessment of pathologic tumor size and staging for invasive breast carcinomas presenting as mammographic masses.

Variation of the prognostic significance of HER-2 expression in breast cancer according to tumor size.

The prognostic importance of HER-2 status in breast cancer has been investigated extensively, but findings have not been uniform across immunohistochemical studies using fixed, paraffin-embedded specimens. We speculate that studies with an overrepresentation of large tumors might not produce evidence for an independent effect of a single marker because breast tumors of larger size tend to exhibit multiple adverse attributes as the malignancy advances through the metastatic cascade. Further, it has been posited that results from certain studies of biologic markers might be generalizable only to larger tumors because tumor repositories tend to house a disproportionate number of larger tumors.

Ameloblastic carcinoma: report of an aggressive case with multiple bony metastases.

Ameloblastic carcinoma is a rare primary tumor of the maxillofacial skeleton with a distinct predilection for the mandible. These lesions may initially show histologic features of ameloblastoma that dedifferentiate over time. Other ameloblastic carcinomas initially present with morphologic features suggestive of ameloblastoma with areas of epithelial dedifferentiation.

Anaplastic thyroid cancer evolved from papillary carcinoma: demonstration of anaplastic transformation by means of the inter-simple sequence repeat polymerase chain reaction.

Background: In thyroid tumors, the coexistence of well- and poorly differentiated tumor types has led to the hypothesis that poorly differentiated thyroid tumors develop from well-differentiated thyroid tumors. By evaluating the genomic instability of histologically distinct but coexisting tumor foci, this study aimed to develop an improved understanding of thyroid tumorigenesis and tumor evolution.

Design: Laser capture microdissection (LCM) was carried out on archival formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded sections from a tumor containing foci of classic papillary thyroid cancer and anaplastic thyroid cancer.

Concordance with breast cancer pathology reporting practice guidelines.

Background: Accurate pathology reporting is important for treatment of breast cancer. The College of American Pathologists (CAP) distributed guidelines for reporting cancer specimens in 1998. The aim of this study was to determine community-wide concordance with CAP breast cancer reporting guidelines.

Differential expression of high-affinity melatonin receptors (MT1) in normal and malignant human breast tissue.

Melatonin is a pineal hormone that strongly inhibits the growth of breast cancer cells in vitro and in vivo. We report thefirst use of immunohistochemical analysis to determine the distribution of the high-affinity melatonin receptor subtype, MTI, in human breast tissue, the hypothalamic suprachiasmatic nucleus, and skin. The MT1 antibody, which is specific for the cytoplasmic portion of the receptor, produced cytoplasmic staining in normal-appearing breast epithelial cells and ductal carcinoma cells; stromal cells, myoepithelial cells, and adipocytes were nonreactive.