Histological examination of the colon

This bachelor´s thesis deals with histological examination of the colon, namely the laboratory diagnosis of colorectal cancer. Colorectal cancer is a highly relevant issue today not only in the Czech Republic, not least because of its continually growing incidence worldwide. Laboratory analysis of this disease is not only important from the aspect of diagnosis per se. Determining the type and invasive stage of the disease is also crucial for the therapeutic strategy in a given patient. Immunohistochemistry testing of the colon also aids in the diagnosis of Lynch syndrome, a hereditary disease with a high risk of colorectal cancer. The first part of the thesis is theoretical and aims to introduce not only the subject of colorectal cancer but also the anatomical, histological and pathological features of the colon. This section also describes the methods used to obtain tissue samples from the colon and to process these in a histopathology laboratory. This information regarding the histopathological processing of colon tissue is then applied and described in detail in the methodology section of the thesis. This describes the process of routine staining methods such as haematoxylin-eosin and Alcian Blue. It also details the manually performed immunohistochemical methods and related reagents, including the use of antibodies. The next section presents a statistical analysis of a sample of patients with colorectal cancer treated at the Jihlava Hospital between 2018 and 2019. These data confirm the generally accepted fact that there is a higher incidence of colorectal cancer in men and that this cancer predominantly affects patients aged between 60 to 70 years. Furthermore, this work shows that defects in the MMR proteins associated with Lynch syndrome are not detected in even one half of the patients tested