Developing indicators for quality assurance in cytopathology. Catalan Society of Cytopathology.

BACKGROUND: Quality control in cytology must be established through reliable and easily measurable indicators. METHODS: From the Catalan Society of Cytopathology a group of experts has been established to write a document with 13 indicators that cover the entire cytological process, based on its Cytopathology Quality Guide. It has been elaborated through guides and documents with scientific evidence and DELPHI methodology in order to reach a structured consensus on the opinions of a group of experts. RESULTS: Thirteen indicators, covering all the cytologic process are expressed in worksheets specifying all their characteristics. CONCLUSION: This document allows the control of all stages of the cytological process.

Autophagy inhibition as a promising therapeutic target for laryngeal cancer.

To identify the putative relevance of autophagy in laryngeal cancer, we performed an immunohistochemistry study to analyze the expression of the proteins involved in this process, namely, LC3, ATG5 and p62/SQSTM1. Additionally, Prostate tumor-overexpressed gene 1 protein (PTOV1) was included due to its potential relevance in laryngeal cancer. Moreover, as cancer resistance might involve autophagy in some circumstances, we studied the intrinsic drug resistance capacity of primary tumor cultures derived from 13 laryngeal cancer biopsies and their expression levels of LC3, ATG5, p62 and PTOV1. Overall, our results suggest that (i) cytoplasmic p62 and PTOV1 can be considered prognostic markers in laryngeal cancer, (ii) the acquisition of resistance seems to be related to PTOV1 and autophagy-related protein overexpression, (iii) by increasing autophagy, PTOV1 might contribute to resistance in this model and (iv) the expression of autophagy-related proteins could classify a subgroup of laryngeal cancer patients who will benefit from a therapy based upon autophagy inhibition. Our study suggests that autophagy inhibition with hydroxychloroquine could be a promising strategy for laryngeal cancer patients, particularly those patients with high resistance to the CDDP treatment that in addition have autophagy upregulation.

APLP2, RRM2, and PRC1: New Putative Markers for the Differential Diagnosis of Thyroid Follicular Lesions.

BACKGROUND: Current methods based on fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) are not sufficient to distinguish among follicular thyroid lesions, follicular adenoma (FA), follicular thyroid carcinoma (FTC), and the follicular variant of papillary thyroid cancer (FVPTC). Furthermore, none of the immunohistochemical markers currently available are sensitive or specific enough to be used in the clinical setting, necessitating a diagnostic hemithyroidectomy. The aim of this study was to identify proteins of value for differential diagnosis between benign and malignant thyroid follicular lesions. METHODS: This retrospective analysis is based on an assessment of the immunoexpression of 19 proteins on 81 benign thyroid lesions (FA) and 50 malignant tumors (FTC/FVPTC). The resulting expression profile allowed the design of a scoring system model to improve the differential diagnosis of benign and malignant thyroid lesions. The model was validated using an independent series of 69 FA and 40 FTC and an external series of 40 nodular hyperplasias, and was further tested in a series of 38 FNAB cell blocks. RESULTS: A model based on the nuclear and cytoplasmic expression of APLP2, RRM2, and PRC1 discriminated between benign and malignant lesions with 100% sensitivity in both main and validation groups, with specificities of 71.3% and 50.7%, respectively. For the nodular hyperplasia series, specificity reached 94.8%. Finally, in FNAB samples, the sensitivity was 100% and the specificity was 45% for discrimination between benign and malignant lesions. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that the identified APLP2, RRM2, and PRC1 signature could be useful for distinguishing between benign (FA) and malignant (FTC and FVPTC) tumors of the thyroid follicular epithelium.

Detection of Thyroid Papillary Carcinoma Lymph Node Metastases Using One Step Nucleic Acid Amplification (OSNA): Preliminary Results.

UNLABELLED: Purpouse: One Step Nucleic Acid Amplification (OSNA) has been previously proposed for the diagnosis of lymph node metastases (LNMs) from several malignant conditions by quantifying the number of copies of cytokeratin 19 mRNA. Our aim was to evaluate the results obtained by OSNA in the lymph nodes of patients with papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) by comparing our results with the findings observed using standard pathological examination. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Fifty human lymph nodes (from five patients with diagnosed PTC) were studied. Each node was divided into two: one half was used for molecular study ("OSNA-node"), and the other half was used for conventional staining with hematoxylin and eosin ("HE-non-OSNA node"). Three cytological imprints using Papanicolaou and May-Grunwald-Giemsa strains were obtained from both node halves. The results from each technique were compared, and ROC analysis was performed. RESULTS: The OSNA study showed 22 positive samples for LNM (44%), which demonstrate a high concordance rate with the results observed using conventional pathological examination (cytology of "OSNA-node" and HE of "Non-OSNA node") with specificity and sensitivity values greater than 86% and 89%, respectively. However, both comparisons differed in the number of copies of mRNA as the best cut-off (260 copies in the first case and 93 in the second case). CONCLUSIONS: The OSNA results for the detection of LNM in patients with PTC are comparable with those observed using conventional techniques. However, its quantitative nature could be useful to more accurately detect lymph node involvement.