Cancer of the penis, a real Brazilian problem: from morphology to molecular etiopathogenesis

Abstract

Carcinoma of the penis (CaPe) is a major health problem in Brazil, especially among economically underprivileged men in north/northeast regions. CaPe is a loco-regional disease and 5 year survival rate drops dramatically in patients with lymph node metastasis. Etiological factors include poor genital hygiene and phymosis, viral infection, ultraviolet radiation, smaking, balanitis xerotica obliterans, and chronic liquen. Although its diagnosis is relatively simple, patients usually seek for medical help in advanced stages of disease. Scientific knowledge, especially of its molecular aspects, is still scarce. The present grant proposal includes a number of studies addressing from clinic morphological aspects, to protein expression and molecular alterations in CaPe. It is intended to validate the WHO classification for these tumors and to establish prognostic variables of the variants of squamous cell carcinomas. A second group of projects deals with immunohistochemical detection of various markers, aiming to establish prognostic and predictive parameters which might foretell lymph node metastasis. Finally, molecular etiopathogenesis will be studied using gene expression techniques, evaluation of chromosomal copy numbers, and search for mutations or hypermethilation of specific genes. With this project we should be able to significantly contribute to a better understanding of this devastating disease. (AU)