The aim of the work is to examine the relationship between the clinical and pathological characteristics of colorectal cancer and indicators of disease progression. The examined group consisted of operative biopsies of colorectal carcinoma (n=75), and the control group (n=75) consisted of biopsies of adjacent non-tumor tissue of the colon from the operative preparation submitted to the Pathology Centre of the Clinical Center of Montenegro. After routine histopathological processing, classic Hematoxylin-Eosin and immunohistochemical ABC method with anti-Ki67 antibodies were applied to the 4 μm sections. The histological grade of the tumor is significantly related to the proliferation index, while the pT status depends on the invasion of lymphatic vessels, metastases in the lymph nodes and the Astler-Coller stage. Metastases in lymph nodes are highly significantly associated with invasion of lymphatic vessels and Astler-Coller tumor stage. Distant metastases are significantly related to blood vessel invasion, perineural invasion and Astler_Coller stage. The histological grade of the tumor, lymphovascular and perineural invasion, the presence of metastases in the lymph nodes, distant metastases and the Astler-Coller stage depend on the proliferative index of the tumor cells. Ki67 expression is a good marker of colorectal cancer progression due to its high sensitivity and specificity.

The aim of this paper is to point out the importance of drugs and their impact on quality of life. Quality of life is a wide multidimensional concept that usually includes, in addition to objective parameters, a subjective assessment of both positive and negative aspects of life. Quality of life is not easy to fully define and therefore there are no clearly defined universally accepted parameters for its assessment. Drugs have a task to prolong the life expectancy of sick people, reduce working ability limitation and total medical costs. The most important standards which drugs must meet are: quality, efficiency and safety. Quantification of objective and subjective parameters of quality of life before and after drug therapy is important for assessing its effect. For this purpose, in addition to generic, “disease-specific questionnaires” are used. Although some of these questionnaires have been used for decades, they primarily give priority to determining objective indicators that are much easier to quantify than subjective ones. Individual understanding of quality of life depends of: social factors (as family and environment in which the patient lives), historical, geographical and cultural factors, age, religion, emotional and intellectual personality traits, physical constitution, health status and profession. Examining the impact of drugs on quality of life and creating precise evaluation criteria are imperatives and challenge for modern pharmacotherapy, as they will facilitate making the right decision about the choice and therapy protocol. The pharmaceutical industry plays an important role in these studies because modern drugs have the task of improving both health and quality of life.