Morphometric approach to immunohistochemistry: carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) in ovarian tumours
Abstract
21 serous and 13 mucinous cystadenocarcinomas and 10 benign mucinous cystadenomas were investigated by immunohistochemical peroxidase method for carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) to test the validity of this method in classification of these tumours. Sections were analysed in three different ways. 1. The whole section was considered a sample and total positivity was subjectively graded. 2. The section was sampled by 25 fields and each graded by two pairs of indexes: fraction and intensity of active epithelium and mucin. 3. The section was sampled by a point counting method (25 points in 25 fields) and points graded according to intensity of staining. Method 2 was reproducible, fast and easy to apply in practice and showed good discrimination ability and was almost as sensitive as method 1. Method 3 was less sensitive and needed much time. The results by method 1 were not in line with the other two methods suggesting that subjective general impression of amount of staining does not reliably reflect the quantity of stained material.