K-ras gene mutation in the diagnosis of ultrasound guided fine-needle biopsy of pancreatic masses

AIM: To investigate the utility of K-ras mutation analysis ofultrasound guided fine-needle aspirate biopsy of pancreaticmasses.METHODS: Sixty-six ultrasound guided fine-needle biopsieswere evaluated by cytology, histology and k-ras mutation.The mutation at codon 12 of the k-ras oncogene wasdetected by artificial restriction fragment lengthpolymorphisms using Bst NI approach.RESULTS: The presence of malignant cells was reported in40 of 54 pancreatic carcinomas and K-ras mutations weredetected in 45 of the 54 FNABs of pancreatic carcinomas. Thesensitivity of cytology and k-ras mutation were 74 % and 83%, respectively. The speciality of cytology and k-ras mutationwere both 100 %. The sensitivity and speciality of k-ras mutationcombined with cytology were 83 % and 100 %, respectively.CONCLUSION: High diagnostic accuracy with acceptablediscomfort of FNAB make it useful in diagnosis of pancreaticcarcinoma. Ultrasound guided fine-needle biopsy is a safeand feasible method for diagnosing pancreatic cancer.Pancreatic carcinoma has the highest K-ras mutation rateamong all solid tumors. The mutation rate of k-ras is about80-100 %. The usage of mutation of codon 12 of k-rasoncogene combined with cytology is a good alternative forevaluation of pancreatic masses.