Diagnostic immunohistochemistry of tumors of the central nervous system

The hopes of the early eighties for detecting a marker which would be specific for tumor cells as such or for a tumor of specific tissue or organ differentiation line have not been fulfilled. Thus, a tumor marker is a substance the level of which increases but which is not unique for tumor cells. The marker may be localized within the neoplastic cell or on its surface. The marker may also be produced by the tumor-surrounding tissue under the influence of the tumor. Therefore, the results of identifying the markers should be interpreted with great caution and should be always confronted with the routine results of light microscopy as well as other studies. This is so even if the results greatly enrich the diagnosis. The diagnostic procedures should be based also on fully standardized laboratory techniques (Taylor 1992).