DIAGNOSTIC VALUES OF COPPER, ZINC AND COPPER/ZINC RATIO COMPARED TO HISTOPATHO-LOGICAL EXAMINATION IN PATIENTS WITH BREAST TUMORS

Abstract

Trace elements copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn) have a role in many biochemical reaction as microsource, their metabolism are profoundly altered in neoplastic diseases and since breast cancerrank the first of female cancers, this study aims to evaluate the diagnostic significance ofcopper/zinc ratio in 70 patients with breast tumor and compared to the grade andhistopathological examination. result had been shown that there is significant difference in levelof zinc and copper and copper/ zinc ratio between benign and malignant tumor and thisdifference persist to be present between different grade of malignant breast tumor and it hadbeen found that copper/zinc ratio have diagnostic significance of 78.5% in discriminatingbetween benign and malignant tissue and this had been increased to about 95.1 % indifferentiating between grade of malignant breast neoplasm. So we conclude that copper/zincratio is higher in malignant breast tissue and could be a better indicator of grade of cancer.