ABSTRACT
Molecular cytogenetic approaches hold the promise of developing the least invasive means of objective assessment of gastrointestinal diseases. Tumor suppressor genes, known to be consistently altered or deleted in various neoplasias, including those of the gastrointestinal tract, encode products essential for the maintenance of normal growth controls. Normal human gastrointestinal mucosa contains T cell growth factor α and urogastrone epidermal growth factor. Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) content has been proposed as an objective criterion for differential diagnosis and/or prognosis of colorectal neoplasias. In adenocarcinomas histopathological evaluation suggested that DNA content can be used for prognostic purposes: a better prognosis could be entertained for cases of polyploid DNA content of carcinomas compared to those with an aneuploid pattern. Multiple sampling is strongly advocated to reduce the effects of marked heterogeneity of ploidy characteristics in individual samples from colorectal carcinomas. DNA ploidy assessment has some prognostic value in gastric carcinomas, but only in advanced tumors with lymph node metastases.
