Background and objectives: Gastric cancer is known as one of the most common cancers and causes of deaths. Early and proper diagnosis is one of the most important things for treatment response. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the expression of p53 , CD44 , Ki-67 , and HER-2/neu markers in the gastric cancer and its relationship with histopathological indicators. Methods: This is a descriptive-analytical study on 60 patientsts with cancer who underwent gastrectomy surgery in 2011-2016 in Shohadaye Tajrish Hospital. The participants were investigated for p53 , CD44, Ki-67 , and HER-2/neu markers’ staining plus demographic characteristics, rate of survival, and histopathological features of the tumors. Results: The mean age of the participants (44 males and 16 females) was 60.25±1.29 years. The patients’ survival rate was 23.82±1.56 months on average. The tumor size was reported as 6.09±2.61 cm and the major tumor type reported was intestinal type (n=40, 66.7%). The level of expression of Ki-67 and CD44 makers was recorded as 33.75 and 24.50%, and p53 and HER-2/neu immunostains were positive in 25 (41.7%) and 20 (33.3%) patients, respectively. The expression of p53 and CD44 markers had no significant relationship with the demographic characteristics, rate of survival, and histopathological features of the tumor of patients (all p>0.05). The expression of p53 gene was associated with a lower rate of survival (p=0.014), while the expression of HER-2/neu was associated with higher probability of developing intestinal type of stomach adenocarcinoma (p=0.010) and ulcerative macroscopic view (p=0.034). Conclusion: This study illustrated that p53 and CD44 markers did not have any diagnostic value in predicting the biological behavior of gastric cancer. In fact, incidence of p53 mmunoreactivity was associated with the lower rate of survival, and the expression of HER-2/neu was associated with higher probability of developing the intestinal type of stomach adenocarcinoma and ulcerative macroscopic view.

Background & Objective:Liver biopsy is the main method for grading and staging liver disorders, but the effects of clinical information and optimal biopsy specimen size on interpretation remain contentious. The aim of the study was to evaluate the impact of clinical information and quality of liver specimen on inter-observer agreement for liver disease. Methods:A total of 289 consecutive biopsy specimens from 2010 to 2017 were re-evaluated by five pathologists using the modified Ishak and non-alcoholic fatty liver diseases (NAFLD) activity score (NAS) systems. Detailed clinical information was extracted from medical records of patients and the size of all liver biopsy samples was recorded. Results:Full agreement between primary diagnosis and final diagnosis was obtained in 214 cases (74%). The remaining cases, namely 22 (7.6%) and 53 (18.3%) biopsies had minor and major diagnostic discrepancies, respectively. The results showed that the overall agreement was significantly higher in cases with complete clinical information than patients without any clinical information and even with partial clinical information (P<0.001). Interestingly, no significant difference in inter-observer agreement was achieved with a length over 20 mm (P=0.181). However, the inter-observer variation significantly decreased when the number of portal tract was more than 10 (P=0.001).Conclusion:This study identified the impact of clinical information and the number of portal tracts as the key factors to diagnosis. Therefore, request forms for liver biopsies should always be accompanied with the clinical history. Moreover, adequacy of biopsy specimens is very useful for accurate evaluation of samples by pathologists.

Background: Gastrointestinal (GI) tract is the most common site for extranodal lymphoma. The primary GI lymphoma pattern in Iran is different from western countries and has been changed during the past 40 years. Objectives: This study was done to determine the clinical and pathological characteristics of primary GI lymphoma in Tehran, Hamedan, and Mashhad regions in Iran. Methods: In this cross-sectional comparative-descriptive study, 200 patients with primary GI lymphoma in Tehran, Hamadan, and Mashhad regions from 2011 to 2016 were enrolled in a consecutive manner, where the clinical and pathological characteristics of cases were determined. Results: Among 200 patients, 141 (70.5%) subjects were male and 59 (29.5%) subjects were female. The mean age at diagnosis was 54.3 ± 19.3 years. Also, 84%, 8.5%, and 7.5% of the patients’ specimens were from Tehran, Hamedan, and Mashhad, respectively. The stomach was the principal involved location in approximately half of the cases. Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), was the main subtype that was observed in 64% of the cases. Treatment in 72% of cases was a combination of surgery and chemotherapy. The 5-year survival was assessed in 147 patients with a rate of 68%. Conclusions: Primary GI lymphoma is seen more in male subjects younger than 60 years of age with non-specific symptoms. Also, DLBCL and MALToma are the main histologic types, and the 5-year survival for all cases is 68.0%. The clinical symptoms showed no specific pattern and accordingly, patients with weight loss and abdominal pain should be considered in in differential diagnosis of malignant lymphoma.

Background: Gastric cancer is one of the most common cancers among Iranian men and women. Objectives: The aim here was to investigate different histopathologic types and features of this cancer in association with selected prognostic variables. Methods: A retrospective cross-sectional study was performed to reevaluate the pathologic samples of 100 cases of gastric cancer referred to Shohadaye Tajrish Hospital, Tehran, Iran from 2017 to 2022. Results: We evaluated 100 cases of gastric cancer in this study. They had a mean age of 62.4 ± 13.44 years old (range 28 - 84 years) and were mostly men (n = 66, 66 %). On histopathologic evaluation, tubular carcinoma was the most common type (n = 45, 45%). We found a statistically significant correlation between the histologic type and perineural invasion (P-value = 0.024), lymphovascular invasion (P-value < 0.001), tumoral involvement of surgical margin (P-value = 0.012 ), infiltration depth of the primary tumor (pT) (P-value = 0.049) , number of metastatic lymph nodes (pN) (P-value = < 0.001) , tumor location in the antrum (P-value=0.033) and body (P-value = 0.013) , and tumor size (P-value = 0.002 and P-value = 0.031 in small and large size groups respectively). Conclusions: According to the findings, histologic type of gastric cancer correlates with perineural invasion, lymphovascular invasion, tumoral involvement of the surgical margin, pT, pN, and tumor location and size.

Background: Human herpesvirus type 8 (HHV-8) is a member of the herpes family that, like other herpesviruses, causes a lifelong infection following entrance into the human body. The etiological agent of Kaposi's sarcoma, this virus, was first identified in a biopsy of a Kaposi's sarcoma tumor in an HIV-infected patient. Objectives: The aim of this research was to evaluate the prevalence of HHV-8 in semen specimens from HIV-negative individuals. Methods: Semen specimens obtained from HIV-negative individuals referred to an infertility center were transferred to the central laboratory for HHV-8 DNA amplification via the nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique. Results: The prevalence of HHV-8 in the referral population was 26%. Conclusions: The prevalence of HHV-8 in the semen samples of our study population may be representative of its prevalence in the normal population. Further studies are, therefore, recommended to determine the prevalence of the virus in the normal Iranian population.