Histochemistry in the diagnosis of early prostatic carcinoma

Twenty-seven prostatic adenocarcinomas, most of them well differentiated, were examined for acid mucoproteins by the Kreyberg and alcian blue-periodic acid-Schiff methods. Seventeen (63 per cent) showed varying amounts of positive material in the lumens of the malignant glands. The procedures can be performed on routinely fixed and paraffin blocked tissues, and are useful in confirming the presence of malignant disease in equivocal cases in which crush artifact or small amounts of very well differentiated tumor acini are present.