Background: Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer in women and considered as a major public health problem. Studies have shown that certain factors, called risk factors, increase the likelihood that a woman will develop breast cancer. p53 is a tumor suppressor gene and plays important roles in the etiology of breast cancer. This polymorphism has been studied in many populations worldwide and these studies have produced conflicting results concerning the role of p53 codon 72 polymorphism (G>C) on the risk of breast cancer. The present study was planned to observe the association of p53 codon 72 polymorphism with invasive ductal breast cancer in Bangladeshi women.

Methods: This retrospective study included 203 patients with histologically confirmed invasive breast carcinoma. p53 codon 72 genotype was determined by using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) technique.

Results: 38% of the patients belonged to 41-50 years age group. Histological findings showed 79.32% grade II cancer, 82% T2 stage tumor, 48% metastatic ductal carcinoma, and 64.3% N1 lymph node involvement among the collected samples. 65.5% patients were positive for ER expression and PR and HER2 expression were mostly negative (69%). The heterozygous GC genotype (Arg/Pro) was found most common (58.6%) among the patients. GC heterozygous genotype significantly related with having smaller tumor with OR 4.667 (2.168 to 10.047). However, GC heterozygous genotype significantly increased the odds of Axillary lymph node metastasis with OR 10 (3.736 to 26.768). Moreover, GC heterozygous genotype significantly increased the odds of lymph node involvement with OR 7.143 (2.934 to 17.391). GC heterozygous genotype was also significantly involved with Negative PR expression. The other two immunohistochemical parameters, i.e. ER and HER2 showed no significant association with p53 codon 72 genotype variants.

Conclusion: Our findings suggest that invasive ductal carcinoma patients who present heterozygous genotype at codon 72 of p53 gene, are susceptible to axillary lymph node metastasis and lymph node involvement