Immunohistochemical and Lectin-Histochemical Patterns of Renal Non-Neoplastic and Neoplastic Epithelium: Utility of the Patterns in the Differential Diagnosis of Renal Epithelial Tumors

Renal tumors are considered to be composed of several distinct subtypes with different cell origin. In this study, we tried to find useful immunohistochemical and lectin histochemical patterns for the differential diagnosis and the origin of the tumor relative to the components of the nephron. Typical cases of clear cell carcinoma, granular cell carcinoma, chromophobe cell carcinoma, collecting-duct carcinoma, papillary carcinoma and oncocytoma, as well as sufficient margin of normal renal parenchyma were stained immunohistochemically and lectin-histochemically, using antibodies and lectins reported to show differences in reactivity. Non-neoplastic epithelial cells showed specific reactivity according to the nephron segments. Some of our staining results tended to differ from those reported earlier by other investigators. Neoplastic lesions showed specific immunoreactivities and the staining results were similar to those of the normal nephron segment, suggesting the origin of the respective tumors. Our results suggest that testing the immunoreactivity pattern using a panel of antibodies and lectins is useful for the differential diagnosis of renal neoplastic lesions