The pitfalls of immunohistochemistry

Abstract

This is 1996. I had returned to a consultant histopathologist鈥檚 post at St Luke鈥檚 Hospital the year before, and had become acquainted socially with a Maltese commercial lawyer and his ex-pat wife. Shortly afterwards, he informed me that his wife hasn鈥檛 been well and that Dr Mario Vassallo had just performed a private gastroscopy, was worried she had something serious and whether I would mind looking at the biopsy material. Mario Vassallo found a large gastric ulcer with rolled edges, practically diagnostic of a carcinoma. Fortunately the histology showed a low grade lymphoma of 鈥渕ucosa-associated lymphoid tissue鈥� (MALT) type, which carried a far better prognosis.