A study of her-2/ neu oncogene expression in benign and malignant ovarian tumors

A study of her-2/ neu oncogene expression in benign and malignant ovarian tumors Gupta S.1*, Mehra M.2, Khattri J.3, M.4 DOI: https://doi.org/10.17511/ijmrr.2020.i02.06 1* Sumit Gupta, Associate Professor, Department of Pathology, N.I.M.S Medical College, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. 2 Manju Mehra, Professor, Department of Pathology, N.I.M.S Medical College, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. 3 Jyotsana Khattri, Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology, N.I.M.S Medical College, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. 4 Madhvi , Junior Resident, Department of Pathology, N.I.M.S Medical College, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India.


Introduction
Ovarian cancer accounts for 6 % of all female genital cancer [1]. India has the second-highest incidence of ovarian cancer globally. Ovarian cancer includes a broad spectrum of lesions ranging from

Results
In study 32 ovarian tumors were studied, out of which 44.5% of tumors were benign, 5.5% were borderline and 50% were malignant.
It was found that out of 32 studied ovarian tumors, 64.9% were epithelial tumors, 21.6% were germ cell tumors, 8.1% were sex cord-stromal tumors and 5.4% were metastatic tumors.

None of the sex cord and metastatic tumors were
Her-2/neupositive. Hence the association of epithelial ovarian tumors was more with Her-2/neu than with other ovarian tumors and the difference was statistically significant. The expression of Her-2/neu was not associated with the stage of ovarian tumors (Figure 1).

Gupta S. et al: A study of her-2/ neu oncogene expression in benign
International Journal of Medical Research and Review 2020;8(2) The positive expression of Her-2/neu was more in patients with high-grade ovarian tumors in comparison to low grade. Out of all studied malignant ovarian tumors, maximum Her-2/neu positivity (72.2%) was present in serous adenocarcinoma and its association with Her-2/neu was statistically significant as compared to others.
No statistically significant association of her 2 neu positivity with age and size of the tumor was found In concordance with another study [10,11].
Among all malignant epithelial tumors, 61.5% of cases were her-2/neu positive and 39.5% were negative. In germ cells, tumor 18.2% cases were her 2 neu positive and rest 81.8% were negative.So, her-2/neu was statistically significantly associated with epithelial tumors than with other ovarian tumors compared to another study [12] and with non-cordance with another study [13,14]. The non-epithelial tumors of ovary rarely showed her-2/neu expression comparable to another study [8]. HER2 expression is associated with a worse outcome of ovarian cancer, implicating HER2 may be a potential prognostic indicator for ovarian cancer patients [16].
In the present study out of 8 (48.5%) patients with early-stage ovarian cancer (Stage I and 2); 43.7%patients were her-2/neu positive and 56.3% were her-2/neu negative while out of 51.5% patients were with advanced-stage ovarian cancer (stage III/IV), with 64.7% cases were her-2/neu positive and 35.3%were her -2 /neu negative; concluding the expression of her-2/neu is independent of ovarian cancer stage [14,15]. The number of cases the current study received during the period of study was limited. Hence the association of various ovarian tumor type and Her-2/neu co-relation need to be a further study in a large sample size.

Conclusion
Epithelial tumors were commonest among all ovarian tumors studied; most common being serous tumors. The majority of tumors were unilateral and were seen in multiparous women and the majority had a size between 5-14 cms. The majority of tumors were in high grade and presented in advanced stages. Her-2/neu positivity was seen in 24.3% of ovarian tumors. All the benign and borderline tumors were negative for her-2/neu. What does the study add to the existing knowledge