Dear xx We use a method of assessing slides which may fit your needs, called the immunoreactive score (IRS). This method assesses slides by counting the number of cells in a field which are negative(0), weak positive(1), medium staining(2) and strong positives(3) These numbers are expressed as a percentage and multiplied by the number after the classification to give an overall immunoreactive score for the slide between 0 and 300. We have used this method to correlate the ELISA score for oestrogen receptors with immunostaining of breast tumour slides with some success, albeit a fair bit of eyeball work work! Of course the usual caveats apply: your block or slide may not be representative of the tumour, and a lot of stromal cells will bias your result. Variants exist which also assess the number of tumour cells per field. Also be aware of the need for standards: no two immuno runs will give you the same result in terms of intensity. A good reference to this type of work is: Kieback et al. Anticancer Research 13: 2489-2496, 1993. (IRS versus CARL in Ovarian Cancer) Eric P Miller Edinburgh Medical Oncology Unit "Wouldn't it be nice if hospitals and schools had all the money they needed and the army had to hold jumble sales to buy guns?" On Wed, 28 Jan 1998, xx wrote: > > I have been searching, without success, for a methodology description > of semi-quantitative scoring/interpreting of immunostained slides. A > reference to a book chapter or review article, the "materials and > methods" section of an otherwise focused journal article, a symposium > handout, or even a faded xerox of someone's old procedure manual would > be greatly appreciated. This seemingly very simple request has thus far > confounded some highly respected authorities in the field and exceeded > the capabilities of MedLine and other electronic search engines. Great > honors (principally in the form of bragging rights) will accrue to the > individual who can shed some light on this issue. Thanks in advance for > your assistance. > >
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