Role of Immunohistochemistry of Cyclooxygenase -2 Expression in Breast Carcinoma.

Background: In 21st century, Cancer has emerged as the one of the major public health problem across the globe. It exerts a significant impact on everyone involved ranging from individual affected to their families, communities and healthcare systems. According to GLOBOCON 2020, female breast cancer has surpassed the lung cancer as the most common cancer across worldwide with an estimate of 2.3 million new cases (11.7%) being diagnosed followed by lung cancer (11.4%). Objectives: The present study was conducted to study the overexpression of cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) in the patients of breast cancer and its association with the clinical, pathological data, including age, size, site of tumor, histological type, grade, lymph node metastasis and stage of tumor. Material and Methods: This was a Prospective Study carried out in a Tertiary Care Centre situated at western part of India. The study duration was 1 year, and the period was from November 2022 to November 2023 with the department of Pathology after obtaining clearance from the institutional ethics committee and written informed consent from the study participants. All patients diagnosed with breast carcinoma attending Tertiary Care Centre were included. Exclusion criteria included tru-cut biopsy, breast excisions without axillary evacuation, lumpectomies without axillary evacuation, cases with no residual invasive carcinoma after pre-surgical (neoadjuvant) chemotherapy or with massive necrosis or fibrosis. A p-value of <0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Out of 20 patients, 85% of patients were females and rest 15% males. ER positivity was seen in 85% of cases, while PR positivity was observed in 75% of cases. HER-2/neu overexpressed was seen in 20% while COX-2 overexpression on immunohistochemistry was seen in 10% patients. The association between COX-2 overexpression and ER negative was statistically significant (p = 0.016). Conclusion: It can be concluded from the present study that the inhibition of COX-2 expression may lead to retard tumour progression and thus, limiting breast carcinogenesis which may have therapeutic implications for the prevention and treatment of breast cancer in such patients with high risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]