Abstract:
This is descriptive retrospective case study conducted in Omdurman teaching hospital during the period from January 2017 to August 2017. The study aimed to detect the expression of N-RAS in thyroid tumors among Sudanese patients.
Total of 40 fixed paraffin blocks previously diagnosed as thyroid tumors, 28 (70%) were malignant samples include, 16(40%) papillary thyroid cancer, 8(20%) follicular carcinoma and 4(10%) medullary thyroid carcinoma, and 12(30%) samples were benign include, 9(22.5)% samples multinodular goiter and 3(7.5%) samples werefollicular adenoma were enrolled in this study.
One section of 3 microns was cut from each block and stained by immunohistochemicalmethod (avidinbiotin technique) for N-RAS detection. The data obtained were analyzed using SPSS computer program version 20.
The patients ages ranged between 11-78 years with mean age of 39years, most of them 32(80%) were less than 50 years and the remaining 8(20%) were above 50 years.
The sex of patient showed the majorly of them were female 28(70)%and 12(30%) were male.
N-RAS showed positive expression in 10(25%)samples. All of them were malignant, 6(15%) samples were papillary thyroid cancer, 3(7.5%) samples were follicular carcinoma and 1(2.5%) sample weremedullary thyroid carcinoma, While 30(75%) samples were negative for N-RAS divided as 18(45%) in malignant and 12(30%) in benign, with significant correlation between N-RAS expression and thyroid tumorsdiagnosis (P.value0.036).
The study concluded that N-RAS expression is associated with malignant form of thyroid tumors.
