Differences in Molecular Pathologic Characteristics of PancreaticAdenocarcinoma between Egyptian andMoroccan Patients

Abstract

Introduction:Pancreatic cancer has not been well studied, especially in developingcountries. Materials and Methods:We studied the variations in genetic mutations inpancreatic adenocarcinoma between Moroccan and Egyptian populations. Themolecular pathology of 30 tumors from a large hospital in Casablanca, Morocco wereexamined and compared with the findings of 44 tumors from the Gharbiah Governatein Egypt. K-ras mutations in codons12 and 13 in addition to p53 mutations in exons5-8 were evaluated. Results:Overall, differences in the rates of K-ras mutations were not statisticallysignificant (48.00 and 34.09%, respectively); however differences in rates of p53mutations were statistically significant with p53 mutations more common in Moroccantumors than in Egyptian tumors (46.67 and 16.28%, respectively). G?Tmutations ofthe K-ras gene were most commonly seen Egyptian tumors, whereas G?Amutationswere the most common type of mutations in Moroccan tumors. Logistic regressionanalysis showed that a p53 mutation in any exon as well as a p53 mutation in exon 5predicted the country of residence and those mutations occurred more frequently inMoroccan patients. Conclusion:Our study shows that differences exist within the Arab population inthe molecular pathology of both the K-ras and p53 genes. Further studies are necessaryto clarify the differences in molecular pathways of pancreatic cancer in the Middle Eastand to investigate the role of environmental and/or genetic factors related to thosepathways.

Keywords

• Pancreatic cancer
• Molecular pathology
• K-ras
• p53
• Egypt
• Morocco