STEROID-HORMONE RECEPTORS RELATED TO PARAMETERS CHARACTERIZING THE BIOLOGY OF HUMAN BREAST-CANCER

Steroid hormone receptors are important parameters to characterize bre ast tumors. Thus, it is important to evaluate their relationships with factors such as histological type and size of the tumor, axillary lym ph node invasion and distant spread, age and menopausal status of the patients, and parameters of tumor differentiation. The receptor levels observed vary within wide ranges, Therefore, statistically significan t differences between different groups of parameters are seldom found. A significant dependence on receptor levels has been observed only fo r patient age and menopausal status, The parameters clinical stage, tu mor size, tumor histology, metastatic involvement and histopathologic grading showed no statistically significant relation with receptor lev els. Nevertheless, a relationship exists between all parameters mentio ned and the frequency of a positive receptor status, Consequently, rec eptor status can contribute to define the biological behavior of the d isease in specific groups of patients, In individual cases other param eters than the biochemical evidence of steroid receptor binding seem t o be more important, We found that data derived from DNA flow cytometr ic measurements allowed a better recognition of tumor aggressiveness t han ER status, In axillary lymph node metastases we usually observed h igher receptor levels than in primary tumors, but we did not find an a ge dependency of ER levels in these metastases.