Breast Cancer Research

official impact factor 5.79

Highly Access Editorial

Prognostic ability of a panel of immunohistochemistry markers – retailoring of an 'old solution'

Donal J Brennan and William M Gallagher*

Author Affiliations

UCD School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Science, UCD Conway Institute, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland

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Breast Cancer Research 2008, 10:102 doi:10.1186/bcr1854

Published: 25 February 2008

Abstract

An urgent requirement exists for new prognostic and predictive assays in breast cancer. Despite the development of high-throughput technologies such as DNA microarrays, it would now appear that immunohistochemistry (IHC) may play an increasingly important role in the clinical management of breast cancer. In this editorial, the authors discuss the potential prognostic ability of a panel of IHC markers, and question whether this well-established assay technology may in fact allow for improved prognostic and predictive tests in breast cancer.