Diagnosing Mesothelioma
Distinguishing a mesothelioma from a lung adenocarcinoma is critical in asbestos malignancies. Over time, diagnoses made on the basis of morphology and the presence of asbestos bodies gave way to immunohistochemistry. Immunohistochemical staining panels keep changing and debates often rage over whether say a positive calretinen, etc. and negative CEA, etc. is enough or whether they merely show for example an adenoma of mesothelial origin. Now there's a new paper out discussing the use of epigenetic (your genes aren't so deterministic after all) profiles. Its title is "Differentiation of lung adenocarcinoma, pleural mesothelioma, and nonmalignant pulmonary tissues using DNA methylation profiles" and you can buy a copy of it there.
Of course all these new methodologies raise the obvious question of "What happens when you try to draw causal inferences about a case diagnosed today from epidemiological research conducted at a time long before these diagnostic techniques existed?" Will these then be, at least with regard to the litigation, distinctions without a difference?
