Prognostic significance of nuclear DNA content in small cell carcinoma of the lung

Abstract

The relationship between the nuclear DNA histogram patterns of tumor cells obtained by brushing via bronchoscopy and the survival time of 39 patients with small cell carcinoma of the lung was investigated. The brushing smears were stained by a modified Feulgen method. The nuclear DNA content was measured at 550 nm using a microspectrophotometer. The DNA histogram pattern was classified into type I, which contained a higher proportion of G0G1-phase cells, and type II, which contained a higher proportion of S, G2M-phase cells. The median survival times for the patients with limited disease of type I, type II and the patients with extensive disease of type I, type II were 17.2 months, 10.2 months, 10.0 months, and 5.6 months, respectively. Patients with limited disease of type I had a significantly longer survival time than patients with limited disease of type II. A distinct correlation was found between the histogram pattern and the survival of the patients. These results indicated that the nuclear DNA histogram pattern may be an indicator to allow speculation as to the prognosis of patients with small cell carcinoma of the lung.

Survival of large bowel carcinoma patients with different DNA ploidy

“…More recently a number of studies have demonstrated that aneuploid solid tumours carry a worse prognosis. This is observed with microspectrophotometry or flow cytometry techniques for non-small cell lung carcinomas (Volm et al, 1985a), small cell lung carcinoma (Abe et al, 1985), and ovarian carcinomas (Volm et al, 1985b). Although the prognostic significance of the DNA ploidy pattern is less clearcut than reported by Wolley et al (1982) and Kokal et al (1986), DNA quantitation used in combination with other variables such as class II HLA-DR determinants (Rognum et al, 1983), might add important biological information.…”

DNA ploidy in bronchopulmonary carcinoid tumours.

“…[9][10][11][12][13][14][15] DNA aneuploid tumours arising at other sites may be classified according to DNA index, and a more favourable prognosis is suggested for patients with DNA tetraploid breast'617 and colorectal carcinomas. '8 In the present study, however, there were no discernible aneuploid subgroups of prognostic significance.…”

Hypodiploidy, Ki-67 growth fraction and prognosis of surgically resected lung cancers

“…A multiploidy or a hyperdiploidy had no effect on prognosis. Bengtsson, 1981;Volm et al, 1985;Abe et al, 1985;Zimmerman et al, 1987;Salvati et al, 1988;Dazzi et al, 1990), whereas others failed to demonstrate this relationship (Bunn et al, 1983;Cibas et al, 1989;Cheon et al, 1993 …”