Fifty-three patients with T1 squamous cell cancer of the floor of mouth and ventral surface of the tongue with a known clinical outcome were retrospectively analyzed and arbitrarily divided into "aggressive" and "nonaggressive" groups based on their clinical behavior. Various host and tumor factors were then evaluated in an attempt to determine whether the tumor behavior could have been predicted. The paraffin-embedded tumor specimens were evaluated for tumor differentiation, tumor thickness and tumor invasion, microvessel density, and p53 expression. In addition, a composite morphologic grading score was obtained by combining cell differentiation, nuclear polymorphism, mitosis activity, depth of infiltration, type of infiltration, and lymphatic infiltration. No single technique appeared capable of identifying "aggressive" behavior, although possibly an evaluation of composite factors might show promise in the future.

A study was done to determine whether the risk of cancer development can be calculated through the use of mammographic patterns. Hyperplasia, bland fibrocystic disease, and incident cancers were correlated with Wolfe's mammographic classification scheme. Intraobserver and interobserver consistency were measured in the 8,033 classified mammograms. Maximum observer agreement was achieved by combining high-risk and low-risk categories. The data presented do not support the contention that diffuse mammographic patterns are useful predictors for determining strategies of screening or patient management; large-scale studies are needed before mammographic classification is adopted.

A study was done to quantify the pathologic risk of subsequent breast cancer in women whose biopsies demonstrated proliferative histologic conditions. Out of a total of 10,530 patients, 1,408 had biopsies which were classified as either bland fibrocystic or hyperplastic. The behavior of the disease in these patients was compared to that of the general screened population. It was concluded that women whose biopsies reveal hyperplastic disorder, primarily atypical hyperplasia and fibroadenoma, run the greatest risk of getting cancer. For women with atypical hyperplasia, the risk is 13 times that of the general population, and for those with fibroadenoma it is three times greater.

No abstract

In a study of thermograms of 42 patients with Stage 1 or smaller carcinomas of the breast, 44 confounding cases and 64 randomly selected subjects being screened, we found that the ability of expert thermographers to identify the patients with carcinoma correctly (true positive = 0.238) varied little from the ability of untrained readers (true positive = 0.301). Furthermore, in the expert group, the indexes of suspicion were so high (0.436) and the true-positive levels were so relatively low (0.238, P = 0.0005) that thermography may well have a very limited role as a screening or pre-screening modality for the detection of minimal or Stage 1 breast cancers.