Ma. Kahn et al., COMPARING FLOW CYTOMETRIC ANALYSIS AND NUCLEOLAR ORGANIZER REGION ENUMERATION IN ARCHIVAL ORAL PREMALIGNANT LESIONS, Journal of oral pathology & medicine, 22(6), 1993, pp. 257-262
Flow cytometric analysis (FCA) and silver colloidal nucleolar organize
r region-associated protein staining (AgNOR) have been used individual
ly in assessing the histopathologic nature of various human tumors. Ho
wever, few researchers have investigated the relationship between the
two techniques in a single series. In a retrospective study, we examin
ed 36 premalignant lesions of the oral cavity by FCA and AgNOR on form
alin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue submitted to the University of Te
nnessee, Memphis, oral pathology laboratory. Three categories of epith
elial dysplasia were represented (9 mild, 9 moderate, 6 severe), as we
ll as four epithelial hyperplasias without dysplasia, three squamous c
ell carcinomas, and five fibrous nodules as controls. Parameters recor
ded for each case included age, race, gender, site, light microscopic
diagnosis (LMD), DNA index (DI), total proliferative index (TPI), S-ph
ase (S), range of nucleolar organizer regions (RNOR), and mean number
of nucleolar organizer regions (MNOR). The average maximum nucleolar o
rganizer region count (AMXNOR) for each LMD category was also calculat
ed. The objective of the study was to determine if FCA or AgNOR aided
in the subjective LMD of oral premalignant lesions and if the paramete
rs recorded for the specimens exhibited any positive correlation. The
FCA results indicated an abnormal DI in 6 of the 24 dysplastic lesions
. A positive partial correlation was seen between DI and MNOR (r=0.434
; P < 0.012) and TPI and S (r=0.774; P< 0.0001), holding gender and ra
ce constant. Additionally, the AMXNOR exhibited a slight tendency to i
ncrease for each increasing grade of dysplasia but this could not be c
onfirmed statistically. The results indicate that there is a positive
correlation between FCA and AgNOR but that neither FCA nor AgNOR were
a diagnostic aid in grading oral mucosal dysplasia.