Expression of metallothionein in invasive ductal breast cancer in relation to prognosis.

The aim of this study was to assess the presence and clinical significance of metallothionein (MT) in primary invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast. We investigated 96 cases of routinely fixed and paraffin-embedded primary breast carcinomas with the immunohistochemical method. Positive staining for MT was observed in 52.1% of specimen. In most cases both nuclear and cytoplasmic staining was seen. A statistically significant association was found between MT-positive staining and nuclear grade (p < 0.01). MT-positive cases had a significantly poorer prognosis when compared with the MT-negative cases (p < 0.01). We concluded that the MT expression may be of a prognostic value for primary invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast and is possibly an indicator of more aggressive and less differentiated carcinoma cells.