Cytologic factors associated with prognosis in patients with peripheral adenocarcinoma of the lung measuring 3 cm or less in greatest dimension.

BACKGROUND: Recently, peripheral lung adenocarcinomas (PLA) measuring < or = 3 cm in greatest dimension often have been diagnosed using diagnostic radiology. The objective of the current study was to determine which cytologic factors are associated with a favorable outcome and an unfavorable outcome in patients with PLA. METHODS: Imprint smears from 134 patients with PLA were examined. Sixteen cytologic factors, including necrosis, cellular distribution, overlapping of cell clusters, cluster aggregation, cluster size, cluster thickness, nuclear irregularity, nuclear size, variation in nuclear size, multinucleated cells, intranuclear inclusions, type of intranuclear inclusions, appearance of nucleoli, eosinophilic nucleoli, multinucleoli, and mitosis, were evaluated using univariate and multivariate analyses. A counting method was used to determine the prognosis for individual patients. RESULTS: In the univariate analysis, a cluster size that measured > or = 831 microm in short dimension (P = 0.0011), moderate or severe nuclear irregularity (P = 0.0030), > or = 5 multinucleated cells per 100 tumor cells (P = 0.0047), moderate or severe variation in nuclear size (P = 0.0061), medium or large nuclear size (P = 0.0169), and > or = 1 mitotic cell per 100 tumor cells (P = 0.0412) were associated significantly with a poor outcome. In the multivariate analysis, cluster size in short dimension (P = 0.0018), multinucleated cells (P = 0.0066), and nuclear irregularity (P = 0.0310) were found to be independent prognostic factors. CONCLUSIONS: The combination of cytologic features using intraoperative imprint smears, namely, cluster sizes < or = 830 microm in short dimension, < or = 4 multinucleated cells per 100 tumor cells, and mild nuclear irregularity, may provide favorable predictive information in patients with PLA.

Analysis of estrogen-like compounds in the environment by high performance liquid chromatography bioassay.

To identify chemicals with endocrine-disrupting activity easily, we developed a new bioassay system, consisting of bioassay using genetically modified yeast expressing human estrogen receptor and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), in which advantages of instrumental analysis and bioassay are combined. The peaks in the mixture of these estrogen-like compounds analyzed using an HPLC bioassay were similar to those obtained by analysis using an HPLC-UV detector. Underground water and sea sediment were analyzed by an HPLC bioassay, and detected a few estrogen-like compounds, respectively. Estrogen-like compounds and yeast-growth inhibitors can be separated by HPLC-bioassay.