Ploidy analysis post Sudbø – where are we now?

In January 2006 the medical research world was rocked by the discovery that a Norwegian Oncologist, Jon Sudbø, had committed extensive scientific fraud. Four papers in three top medical journals had to be retracted. Two of these papers, both published in the New England Journal of Medicine, described how aneuploidy could be used as a prognostic marker in pre-malignant oral epithelial lesions. There was widespread fallout from this scandal, one of the main casualties being the general reputation of ploidy analysis. However, DNA cytometry research has continued and results suggest that ploidy analysis may well be useful as a screening and prognostic marker in a variety of malignant and pre-malignant conditions. In 2008 Torres-Rendon et al published a further study examining the use ploidy as a prognostic marker in oral epithelial dysplasias. Their results, although not as impressive as Sudbø's, do suggest that ploidy analysis is a potentially useful prognostic marker in pre-malignant oral epithelial lesions.