Angiogenic factors in squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity: do they have prognostic relevance?

INTRODUCTION

Angiogenesis is a cascade-like mechanism which is essential for tumour growth and metastasis. Therefore the existence of angiogenic molecules and the density of activated endothelial cells in individual tumours is of major interest. MATERIAL/PATIENTS: In order to evaluate the prognostic significance of these molecules, the distribution pattern was studied of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and activated endothelial cells in tumours and normal, healthy oral mucosal specimens from 51 consecutive patients with primary oral squamous cell carcinoma.

STUDY DESIGN

Frozen sections (vascular endothelial growth factor) and paraffin-embedded sections (endoglin, CD105) were investigated quantitatively by immunohistochemistry. The Pearson correlation, the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test, the non-parametric Wilcoxon rank sum test with multiple comparisons and the non-parametric Kruskal-Wallis test with multiple comparisons were used for statistical analyses.

RESULTS

Endoglin expression in tumour tissue was significantly higher than in normal healthy mucosa (P<0.001). T1 tumours showed a significantly lower staining for endoglin compared with T2, T3 and T4 tumours but there was no increase with each T stage. No statistical correlation was found between VEGF expression and endoglin staining.

CONCLUSIONS

Even though there is controversy about the prognostic relevance of VEGF, our results suggest that the factor is not suitable to decide prognosis in oral cancer. Endoglin may have a significant role in the development of squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity and might be relatively more specific than commonly used endothelial markers.