Glucocorticoids (GCs) are used in cancer treatment to induce programmed cell death in transformed cells of the hematopoietic system and to lessen side effects. Moreover, GCs have been described not only as inhibitors of some chemotherapy or radiation-induced apoptosis, but also as inhibitors of cancer progression by down-regulation or up-regulation of different gene expressions. Recently, it has been suggested that GCs can attenuate estrogen responses through induction of expression and activity of the sulfotransferase. The presence or absence of glucocorticoid receptor (GR) in normal and abnormal breast tissue is thus interesting, and the aim of this study was to analyze the expression of GR during the progression of breast tissue. We tested by immunohistochemistry the expression status of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR), and GR in normal breast parenchyma (n=49), ductal intraepithelial neoplasia (DIN) 1a (n=9), DIN 1b-1c (n=15), DIN 2-3 (n=21), and invasive breast carcinoma (n=39). The evaluation of GR expression was made by using the Allred score. All the normal parenchyma, DIN 1a, DIN 1b, and DIN 1c were ER-positive (ER+) and PR-positive (PR+). Seventeen of 21 DIN 2-3 and 30 of 39 invasive carcinomas were ER+/PR+. The other samples were ER-negative (ER-) and PR-negative (PR-). Moreover, all the ER-/PR- samples were GR-negative. Interestingly, we found a significant correlation between the histologic grade and the GR-negative tumors, and a percentage of positive patients presented with nuclear immunoreaction to GR, which decreases significantly with tumor histologic grade. Understanding the role of GCs in breast carcinoma is thus essential before continuing the widespread use of GCs combined with antineoplastic drugs or agents in the clinical management of women with breast cancer.

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The existence of angiolipoma of the breast in the male must not to be forgotten because this tumor may be confused clinically, radiologically and pathologically with a malignant tumor.

BackgroundThe human papillomavirus (HPV) is the causative agent of cervical cancer, which is the leading cancer-related cause of death for women in Sub-Saharan Africa. In 2013, the Gabonese Ministry of Health and the Sylvia Bongo Ondimba Foundation implemented cervical cancer screening programs based on the detection of cancerous lesions by visual inspection with acetic acid and/or Lugol’s iodine (VIA/VILI). This pilot study was set up to determine the HPV profile and analyze the nucleotide sequence variation of HPV16 circulating in patients with cervical abnormalities detected by VIA/VILI testing.MethodsThe cervical abnormalities observed upon VIA/VILI were confirmed by liquid-based cytology for all tested women. Nested PCR using the MY09/11 and GP5+/6+ primer sets was used to detect HPVs present in the extracted DNA. HPV genotypes were determined after sequencing of amplicons based on a high-throughput sequencing approach. For isolates of the HPV16 genotype, the E6 gene and the long control region (LCR) were directly sequenced using Sanger method.ResultsThe study included 87 women who showed a positive VIA/VILI result. Cervical abnormalities were found in 40.23 % of women and 40 % were classified as high-grade lesions. The HPV detection rate was 82.9 % among women with abnormal cytology. Among all the identified high-risk HPV genotypes, HPV16, 18 and 33 were the most frequent. Multiple HPV infections were observed in 42.31 % of HPV-infected women. Analysis of the HPV16 sequence variation in the E6 gene and in the LCR showed that 85.3 and 14.7 % belonged to the African and European lineages, respectively. Among the African branch variants, Af2 was the most frequently identified in this study.ConclusionThis study offers the first report of the HPV detection rate and molecular epidemiology among Gabonese women with a positive result in a VIA/VILI screening test. Moreover, data on the HPV16 sequence variation confirm the predominance of African variants in high-grade lesions.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13027-016-0098-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

For the first time, we demonstrated a significant prevalence of high-risk HPV in women with cytological proved T. vaginalis infection independent of the age ranges. Our data suggest a potential association between these two infectious agents by the way of a sexual intercourse and probably by a biochemical or immunological reasons.