Breast Carcinoma; Human Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor-2 (HER-2) and Grading Correlation

Introduction: overexpression of human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (her-2) is one of the most important prognostic and predictive factors of breast cancer, observed in 25% - 30% of breast carcinoma patients leading to poor prognosis and feasible anti her-2 antibody drugs. the objective of this study was to evaluate the her-2 frequency in target population and its correlation with histologic grade as well as tumor pathology, estrogen receptor (er) and p53 in our patients. methods: a total of 300 cases (all female) aged 24- 80 year, were randomly selected from patients who were admitted in two of the tehran university of medical sciences affiliated centers (emam khomeini cancer institute and shariati hospital) over a 2-year period (2013-2014). assessment of tumors for her-2, p53, er, pathological type and histologic grade was performed. her-2 over expression defined as three plus (+++) in immunohistochemistry (ihc). results: the mean age was 49.6±11 years. her-2 over expression was seen in 34% of the patients. significant correlations were found between her-2+, p53+ and high histologic grade and er (p<0.05). however, there was no significant correlation between her-2 and pathologic type of tumors in our study. conclusion: co-expression of several poor prognostic biomarkers in breast cancer (her-2 +, p53 +, er- , high grade) may predict more aggressive phenotype, worse disease and lower overall survival in these patients.