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Vol.37 No.4 contents | Japanese/English |
- Original Article -
Detection of Chromogranin A in Small Cell Lung Carcinoma using ImmunoMax
Yoshiaki Sumiyoshi, Takayuki Shirakusa, Katunobu Kawahara and Masahiro Kikuchi*Second Department of Surgery, *First Department of Pathology, School of Medicine, Fukuoka University
Chromogranin A (Cg A) is a family of acidic proteins present in neuroendocrine cells and neoplasm with secretory granules. Therefore, Cg A has been frequently used to characterize neuroendocrine tumors by immunohistochemical analysis. Most endocrine tumors usually express Cg A protein, however some neuroendocrine tumors with few secretory granules, like small cell lung carcinoma (SCLC) may occasionally show a false negative immunoreactivity using the conventional ABC method. We analyzed the immunohistological staining of Cg A in 20 cases of SCLC in formalin-fixed paraffin embedded tissue, using our new maximized immunohistochemical method (ImmunoMax). Although only three cases (12.5%) were detectable using the conventional ABC method. However, using the immunoMax method 17 cases (70.8%) of 20 cases with SCLC showed a positive Cg A reaction. These results indicated that Cg A staining with the ImmunoMax method could be useful as an aid in the diagnosis of SCLC, even when it is not detectable by conventional methods, therefore more accurate diagnosis of small cell carcinoma would be possible.
key words: Chromogranin A , Immunohistochemistry, ImmunoMax, Small cell lung carcinoma
Received: February 28, 1997
Accepted: June 9, 1997
JJLC 37 (4): 485-490, 1997
