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Squamous cell carcinoma of the uterine cervix with distant metastases can be treated by adjuvant chemotherapy. The at-risk patients are those with histologically proven metastases, the presence of tumour in paracervical tissue and parametrium, evidence of vascular invasion, a great depth of invasion, or poor tumour differentiation. Our studies lead us to believe that differentiation and DNA content are also important criteria.

Certain hope is entertained in the prediction of chemosensitivity in vitro/ ex vivo for the purpose of selecting the most effective treatment of malignant diseases with minimal patient loading. The possible choice of an effective substance based on the results of a simple ex vivo test would increase the success of the treatment in case of standard chemotherapy failure or in the treatment of primary chemoresistant tumor. MTT test seems to be an easy process for the prediction of chemosensitivity of isolated malignant cells ex vivo, however each method represents a simple tool, which can provide false results if incorrectly preformed. Numerous limitations significantly reduce the successful evaluation and constituent aspects of the methodic press to further reflections about the proper application of the test.

We studied the relation between the 5-year disease free interval and the flow cytometric DNA content in a group of 55 patients treated by radiation for squamous cell carcinoma of the uterine cervix, stages Ib-IIIb (FIGO). The diploid DNA content was associated with a better prognosis, while prognostically unfavourable tumours tended to be aneuploid. The relation was statistically significant in the whole group (p = 0.016), in stage II disease (p = 0.003) and in the subgroup formed by the combination of stages I and II (p = 0.000). In stage III we did not prove the relation. Analysis of the survival function revealed also a better prognosis of diploid tumours (p = 0.041) in the whole group. The division into clearly diploid and non-diploid tumours seems to be more suitable for evaluation (p = 0.012). The difference between the prognostically favourable and unfavourable groups is expressed more clearly. We consider the flow cytometric DNA content a perspective prognostic parameter in squamous cell carcinoma of the uterine cervix. Its significance is apparent especially in patients treated by radiotherapy, because the size of the tumour cannot be assessed reliably in these cases.

We have analyzed p53 protein expression in 121 primary breast cancer biopsies by immunohistochemistry using the monoclonal antibody DO-1 and polyclonal serum CM-1. p53 protein overexpression has correlated in our study with mitotic activity (p=0.001), nuclear atypia (p=0.002), less favorable histological type of tumor and in a lesser extent with tumor size. The inverse, but highly significant, correlation (p=0.007) has been observed with lymph node involvement. There was also a trend for higher p53 positivity among DNA aneuploid tumors as compared with DNA diploid cases, but this was not significant. Our study suggests that p53, at least in some patients, may not be directly involved in the process of metastatic progression in breast cancer. Preliminary data would suggest that the detection of p53 protein overexpression could be a useful additional prognostic parameter in breast cancer.