The Prognostic Significance of Chromosome Abnormalities in Colon Tumors

THE CHROMOSOME COMPLEMENTS of all well-studied human solid tumors have been abnormal. Similar tumors have been shown to have widely different types of chromosome abnormalities. This variation suggests that many tumors could be sub-grouped by the type of cytogenetic abnor-mality present as well as by the presence or absence of specific marker chromosomes. Until recently, the number of adequately studied tumors of a given type has been too small to permit possible correlation of these subgroups with various clinical parameters such as the tendency to metastasize, re-sponse to therapy, or longevity. Two stud-ies have recently been reported in which a