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PURPOSENasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), a malignant neoplasm of the epithelium covering the nasopharynx, is a rare disease in most parts of the world. Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), the most potent oncogenic virus, coupled with environmental and genetic factors has been identified to play a role in the development of NPC. An array of methods for detecting the virus do exist, from serologic detection of antibodies to DNA amplification. There is paucity of local data on the status of EBV infection in relation to NPC within the region, and this study attempts to shed more light on the subject.METHODSThis was a retrospective cross-sectional laboratory-based study on histologically confirmed, archived tissues from July 2015 to June 2019. Immunohistochemistry expression of latent membrane protein-1 (LMP-1) was used to detect EBV infection in the tissues.RESULTSA total of 71 cases were enrolled in this study. The mean age was 47.87 years ± 16.84 years with a male-to-female ratio of 1.5:1. There was a unimodal distribution of EBV detection, with the peak (26.8%) at 36-45 years. About 45.1% of the 71 samples tested positive for LMP-1, all of which were nonkeratinizing carcinoma. Nonkeratinizing carcinoma was the most common histopathologic subtype (n = 67; 94.4%), with the majority (38 of 67; 56.7%) being undifferentiated and 29 of 67 (43.3%) differentiated. Keratinizing and basaloid subtypes had two cases each, representing 2.8%.CONCLUSIONA significant proportion of NPC, particularly nonkeratinizing histologic subtype, seems to show LMP-1 positivity by immunohistochemistry, which may be adopted in resource-constrained settings to detect EBV infection in these tissue biopsies.

Background: Meningiomas that are progesterone receptor positive have a low recurrence rate and good prognosis compared to those that are progesterone receptor negative. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of expression of progesterone in meningiomas and its association with clinicopathological characteristics. Materials and methods: This was a cross-sectional laboratory-based study that was conducted at Muhimbili National Hospital. The study included 112 formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue blocks of patients who were confirmed to have meningiomas on histological basis from January 2010 to December 2014. Immunohistochemical expression of progesterone receptor was tested using a primary monoclonal progesterone receptor antibody ready to use (IR 068 Dako). The χ2 test was used to determine the association between clinicopathological characteristics and progesterone receptor expression. A 2-tailed P < 0.05 was considered significant. Results: The mean age of the patients was 45.5 ± 3.601 years, and majority (66.1%, n = 74) were in the age group between 31 and 60 years. Also, majority of the patients (60%, n = 67) in this study were females. Over one-third of the cases (34.8%, n = 39) comprised of meningotheliomatous subtype, and majority of the cases (89.3%, n = 100) were of grade I. The prevalence of progesterone expression was 54.5% (n = 61), and only age was associated with progesterone receptor expression (P = 0.043). Conclusion: The finding of high expression of the progesterone receptor for grade I cases in this study indicates that progesterone receptor expression in meningiomas is of prognostic value and may be considered when evaluating patients for management. Lack of expression of progesterone receptor in all the malignant cases is intriguing and needs further studies that can investigate its prognostic role.