Rs. Alrashed et al., LIMITED VALUE OR ARGYOPHIL NUCLEOLAR ORGANIZER REGIONS IN THE ASSESSMENT OF ESOPHAGEAL LESIONS, Saudi medical journal, 18(6), 1997, pp. 591-593
Objective: To determine the usefulness of the argyophil nucleolar orga
nizer scores in predicting malignant or aggressive behavior in neoplas
tic and non-neoplastic lesions of the esophagus. Methods: The silver s
taining technique for argyophil nucleolar organizer regions was perfor
med on 66 specimens of formalin fixed paraffin wax embedded esophageal
biopsies: Twenty six (26) normal biopsy specimens, 4 cases of squamou
s papilloma, 10 cases of well differentiated squamous cell carcinoma,
16 cases of moderately differentiated squamous cell carcinoma and 10 c
ases of adenocarcinoma were studied. Results: The mean AgNOR scores an
d range of values were as follows: Normal esophageal squamous epitheli
um, mean 6.3 (range 4.8 to 7.4); squamous papilloma, mean 8.6 (range 6
.9 to 10.2) well differentiated squamous cell carcinoma, mean 6.0 (ran
ge 4.5 to 7.7); moderately differentiated squamous cell carcinoma mean
7.2 (range 5.5 to 8.7); adenocarcinoma mean 5.8 (range 4.5 to 6.5). T
he results of the different diagnostic categories were compared using
the Kruskal-Wallis test but did not achieve statistical significance.
Conclusion: The AgNOR scores of different esophageal lesions did not p
redict aggressive behavior or malignancy.