Immunohistochemistry and antigenic expression of four proteins in Kaposi Sarcoma

Abstract

Introduction: Kaposi sarcoma poses problems in histological diagnosis because of its broad morphologic variants and similarity to many vasoproliferative lesions. Establishing diagnosis on the basis of tumour marker alone (especially a single result) is fraught with associated pitfalls because of the problem of non- specificity. Method: Fifteen (15) Kaposi sarcoma biopsies from seven (7) men and eight (8) women were used to find out the gene expression of vimentin, desmin, smooth muscle actin (SMA), S-100 and neuron specific enolase (NSE) in Kaposi sarcoma, Haematoxylin and eosin (Hand E) method was used to confirm the diagnosis of Kaposi sarcoma in archival processed biopsies. Subsequently, Immunohistochemistry (IHC) was carried out to find out the expression of the antibodies listed. Results: Vimentin and SMA were found to be most reactive. Neuron specific enolase was mildly reactive while the rest were non-reactive. Conclusion: Only vimentin and SMA offer significant reactivity in the diagnosis of Kaposi sarcoma and are useful in undifferentiated neoplasms.