Nuclear morphometry as a tool of limited capacity for distinguishing renal oncocytoma from chromophobe carcinoma

The principal types of renal tumors include malignant clear cell renal cell carcinoma, chromophobe carcinoma (ChRCC), papillary carcinoma and benign oncocytoma (RO) and adenoma. Both oncocytoma and chromophobe carcinoma are characterized by a solid growth pattern of cell with abundant cytoplasm and in some cases may be difficult to distinguish based on histology only. The material for the study consisted of 58 chromophobe carcinomas and 16 oncocytomas. At least 100 nuclei per case were segmented from images of DAPI-stained slides. The geometric and texture features were extracted and used for analysis. Significant differences between RO and ChRCC were found in all the analyzed parameters, however overlapping of the features exists. None of the constructed models permitted to classify cases in concordance with diagnoses.