Detection by immunohistochemistry of c-erbB2 oncoprotein in breast carcinomas and benign mammary lesions

The presence of the c-erbB2 oncoprotein was demonstrated by immunohistochemistry in a study involving 173 mammary lesions. The lesions included infiltrating cancers, non-invasive neoplasia, as well as atypical and benign lesions. Our aim was to investigate the correlation between the c-erbB2 oncoprotein overexpression and the morphological features of the different mammary tissues analyzed to obtain a better characterization for the growth potential of certain lesions, with emphasis placed on the non-invasive neoplasia and the atypical lesions. Nearly 30% of infiltrating ductal carcinomas (27/89 cases) and 2 out of 24 infiltrating lobular carcinomas were positive. The comedocarcinomas were mostly stained (83%). In contrast, the intraductal carcinomas of cribriform or papillar patterns were consistently negative. No staining was observed in the atypical epithelial hyperplasia located in the vicinity of positive cancers for anti-oncoprotein c-erbB2 antibody. Furthermore, the only 5 positive cases for c-erbB2 out of 32 cancer-free cases were three fibroadenomas and two fibrocystic diseases with atypical ductal hyperplasia. A close correlation was thus observed between c-erbB2 oncoprotein overexpression and cancerous cell morphology, characterized by a marked nuclear hypertrophy often associated with cellular pleomorphism. However, predictive abnormalities of malignant transformation in non-neoplastic epithelial proliferation was difficult to identify, considering only the c-erbB2 expression. A group of tumors with little nuclear abnormalities were found positive for c-erbB2 immunostaining. These probably corresponded to a particular cellular phenotype. Further studies involving other oncogenes should lead to a better characterization of the different tumor phenotypes and help to clarify breast carcinogenesis.