[Flow cytometry in the evaluation of the prognosis and course of malignant soft-tissue tumors]

Investigation of DNA content by flow cytometry method (determination of ploidy and cell proliferation activity) carried out in 45 patients with malignant and 19 patients with benign tumours revealed diploid distribution of DNA in 18 cases and aneuploid in one case of benign tumours. DNA distribution in malignant tumours was diploid in 23 cases (51.1%) and aneuploid in 22 regardless of histological variant of the tumour. Diploid cells were always present in the aneuploid tumours and their number was higher in primary tumours than in recurrent tumours (only tumour cells were found in the cytological control smears). No full correlation is observed between indices of cell proliferation activity obtained by morphological and cytometric methods. Ploidy and proliferation activity (number of cells in S-phase of cell cycle) are prognostic criteria of the survival and duration of disease without recurrence.