Quantitative methylation profiling in tumor and matched morphologically normal tissues from breast cancer patients.

Background: In the present study, we determined the gene hypermethylation profiles of normal tissues adjacent to invasive breast carcinomas and investigated whether these are associated with the gene hypermethylation profiles of the corresponding primary breast tumors.

Methods: A quantitative methylation-specific PCR assay was used to analyze the DNA methylation status of 6 genes (DAPK, TWIST, HIN-1, RASSF1A, RARbeta2 and APC) in 9 normal breast tissue samples from unaffected women and in 56 paired cancerous and normal tissue samples from breast cancer patients.

Results: Normal tissue adjacent to breast cancer displayed statistically significant differences to unrelated normal breast tissues regarding the aberrant methylation of the RASSF1A (P = 0.

Quantitative assessment of DNA hypermethylation in the inflammatory and non-inflammatory breast cancer phenotypes.

In this study, a comparative quantitative methylation profiling of inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) and non-IBC was set up for the identification of tumor-specific methylation patterns. Methylation ratios of six genes (DAPK, TWIST, HIN-1, RASSF1A, RARbeta2 and APC) were measured in benign breast tissues (n = 9) and in tumor samples from non-IBC (n = 81) and IBC (n = 19) patients using quantitative methylation-specific PCR. Median methylation ratios observed in breast cancer (n = 100) were significantly higher than those observed in benign breast tissues for five of six genes (TWIST, HIN-1, RASSF1A, RARbeta2 and APC).

The presence of circulating total DNA and methylated genes is associated with circulating tumour cells in blood from breast cancer patients.

Circulating tumour cells (CTC) and tumour-related methylated DNA in blood have been separately assessed for their utility as a marker for subclinical metastasis in breast cancer. However, no studies have looked into the relation between the both molecular markers in this type of cancer. In this study, we investigated the correlations between total/methylated DNA and CTC in the blood from metastatic breast cancer patients.

Increased sentinel lymph node lymphangiogenesis is associated with nonsentinel axillary lymph node involvement in breast cancer patients with a positive sentinel node.

Purpose: Lymph node (LN) lymphangiogenesis has recently been shown to be important in the premetastatic niche of sentinel LNs. To study its role in the further metastatic spread of human breast cancer, we investigated the association of angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis in sentinel LN metastases with the presence of nonsentinel LN metastases in breast cancer patients with a positive sentinel LN.

Experimental Design: Angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis--quantified as endothelial cell proliferation fraction (ECP%) and lymphatic ECP fraction (LECP%)--were assessed in sentinel LN metastases of 65 T(1)/T(2) patients with breast cancer using CD34/Ki67 and D2-40/Ki67 immunohistochemical double stains.

Use of the levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system in breast cancer patients.

Objective: To study the recurrence of breast cancer among patients who were using the levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system (LNG IUS).

Design: A retrospective, controlled cohort analysis.

Setting: Six Belgian hospitals.

A fibrotic focus is a prognostic factor and a surrogate marker for hypoxia and (lymph)angiogenesis in breast cancer: review of the literature and proposal on the criteria of evaluation.

A fibrotic focus is a scar-like area in the centre of a carcinoma and can be regarded as a focus of exaggerated reactive tumour stroma formation. Although modern surgical pathology uses different histopathological and molecular markers to assess the aggressiveness and predict the behaviour of malignant tumours, markers reflecting stromal cell behaviour and interactions between epithelial cells and stromal cells are scarce. In this review we summarize all studies investigating the value of a fibrotic focus as a prognostic factor and as a surrogate marker for hypoxia and (lymph)angiogenesis in patients with breast cancer.

Induction of lymphangiogenesis in and around axillary lymph node metastases of patients with breast cancer.

We studied the presence of lymphangiogenesis in lymph node (LN) metastases of breast cancer. Lymph vessels were present in 52 of 61 (85.2%) metastatically involved LNs vs 26 of 104 (25.

Detection of circulating tumour cells in blood by quantitative real-time RT-PCR: effect of pre-analytical time.

Background: We and others have recently explored the use of quantitative real-time RT-PCR analysis for the detection of circulating tumour cells in blood of patients with breast cancer (BC). One major problem in these experiments is the in vitro instability of the cellular RNA. The copy number of mRNA can change during storage and transport at room temperature and this may hamper accurate quantitative measurements of specific transcripts, especially when working with small numbers of target mRNAs.

Small bowel obstruction during pregnancy.

The authors report the case of a 28-year old pregnant woman with abdominal pain and contractions at 37 weeks of gestation. After labour and delivery, abdominal pain persisted and laparoscopy was performed. A bowel obstruction was diagnosed and surgically corrected.