Abstract
Background: Despite autophagy being a principal mechanism of tumor progression, its role has been never studied in Paget disease, a difficult to treat intraepithelial neoplasia affecting mainly the breast and the vulvar regions.
Material and methods: Twenty seven cases (17 extramammary and 10 mammary) of Paget disease were immunohistochemically studied for the expression of the two principal autophagic factors, LC3B and p62.
Results: The majority of Paget diseases showed strong cytoplasmic expression of p62 in contrast to nearby keratinocytes which presented nuclear-only p62 staining. LC3B was negative or only mildly positive in neoplastic cells. No difference was seen between mammary and extramammary cases.
Conclusion: The immunohistochemical autophagic profile of Paget disease suggests a down-regulated autophagic process which, thus, may be implicated in the invasive potential of these cells.