Abd El-Wahed Moshira Mohamad
The Department of Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Menoufiya University, Egypt.
J Egypt Natl Canc Inst. 2005 Sep;17(3):173-83.
Maspin is an inhibitor of serine proteinases with tumor suppressor activity that is down-regulated in breast and prostate cancer, but overexpressed in pancreatic carcinoma. However, there were very few published data regarding the role of maspin in ovarian carcinoma. The aim of the present study was to evaluate maspin expression in ovarian epithelial neoplasms and correlate its expression with some clinicopathologic parameters.
Seventy eight paraffin embedded ovarian specimens from patients with ovarian epithelial neoplasms comprised the material of this study. They included 18 benign, 14 low malignant potential (LMP) and 46 malignant epithelial ovarian neoplasms, in addition to seven specimens from normal ovarian tissues as a control.
Immunohistochemical study of maspin expression using streptavidin biotin immunoperoxidase method revealed that, normal ovarian surface epithelium did not express maspin as well as benign serous and mucinous ovarian epithelial neoplasm. However, all benign Brenner ovarian tumors were maspin positive. On the other hand, 57.14% of LMP tumors showed weak maspin expression and 63% of malignant ovarian epithelial tumors showed maspin expression with 39.1% over expression. The two malignant Brenner tumors studied were maspin negative. There was a trend for maspin expression with high grade, high stage, bilateral tumors and tumors with metastasis. Tumors that showed maspin over-expression showed higher mitotic index (MI) (p=0.02). Invasive cancers were more likely to have predominantly cytoplasmic staining compared to LMP tumors.
Maspin was expressed in a substantial proportion of ovarian tumors with poor prognostic parameters. These results may offer new insights regarding the role of maspin in ovarian cancer that may also impact diagnosis and treatment strategies. Moreover, variation in maspin expression between Brenner tumor and other epithelial surface ovarian tumors may indicate that the different histological types probably represent distinct disease entities and involve different molecular pathways.
Maspin是一种具有肿瘤抑制活性的丝氨酸蛋白酶抑制剂，在乳腺癌和前列腺癌中表达下调，但在胰腺癌中过表达。然而，关于Maspin在卵巢癌中的作用， published数据非常少。本研究的目的是评估Maspin在卵巢上皮性肿瘤中的表达，并将其表达与一些临床病理参数相关联。
本研究材料包括78例来自卵巢上皮性肿瘤患者的石蜡包埋卵巢标本。其中包括18例良性、14例低恶性潜能（LMP）和46例恶性上皮性卵巢肿瘤，另外还有7例正常卵巢组织标本作为对照。
采用链霉亲和素生物素免疫过氧化物酶法对Maspin表达进行免疫组织化学研究，结果显示，正常卵巢表面上皮以及良性浆液性和黏液性卵巢上皮肿瘤均不表达Maspin。然而，所有良性Brenner卵巢肿瘤Maspin呈阳性。另一方面，57.14%的LMP肿瘤显示Maspin弱表达，63%的恶性卵巢上皮肿瘤显示Maspin表达，其中39.1%为过表达。所研究的2例恶性Brenner肿瘤Maspin呈阴性。Maspin表达有随高级别、高分期、双侧肿瘤和有转移的肿瘤而增加的趋势。显示Maspin过表达的肿瘤有更高的有丝分裂指数（MI）（p=0.02）。与LMP肿瘤相比，浸润性癌更易主要表现为细胞质染色。
Maspin在相当一部分具有不良预后参数的卵巢肿瘤中表达。这些结果可能为Maspin在卵巢癌中的作用提供新的见解，这也可能影响诊断和治疗策略。此外，Brenner肿瘤与其他卵巢上皮表面肿瘤之间Maspin表达的差异可能表明不同的组织学类型可能代表不同的疾病实体，并涉及不同的分子途径。
