Histopathological examination of dermatoses in dogs, immunohistochemical evaluation of androgen and estrogen receptor expressions: Retrospective study

Skin diseases are the most common diseases in veterinary clinical practice. In clinical dermatology, these diseases are easily visible, but their diagnosis and treatment bring many difficulties. Dermatology is one of the specialities that is not possible without effective communication between the clinician and the pathologist and dermatology-specific knowledge and experience. Dermatopathology has a different language from medical terminology. The mastery of this language by clinicians interested in dermatology is of great importance for understanding the pathology report and thus regulating the diagnosis and treatment of the disease. Veterinary dermatopathology is developing every day in proportion to the increasing intensity in clinical practice, and it is one of the areas where multidisciplinary study is needed with new analysis methods. Histopathology alone is not a sufficient method of analysis in skin diseases. The report provided by histopathology can only be used as an orientation, differential diagnosis tool or guide for the clinician and usually does not contain a definitive diagnosis. Immunohistochemistry is frequently used in tumor pathology in veterinary pathology, but it is one of the analysis methods that has not been included in routine practice. Incorporating immunohistochemical methods, which are frequently used in research to define the morphological features and pathogenesis of diseases, into routine practices will provide a great advantage in the diagnosis of diseases. In our study, the expression and density of estrogen and androgen receptors in the skin cells of non-neoplastic skin diseases in dogs were identified. It is thought that the findings regarding the expression of sex steroids will contribute to elucidating the mechanisms related to hair follicle development and cycle in skin diseases in both animals and humans.