Eivazi Behfar, Werner Jochen A, Roessler Marion, Negm Hesham, Teymoortash Afshin
Department of Otolaryngology, Philipp University of Marburg, Germany.
Acta Otolaryngol. 2012 Jan;132(1):86-9. doi: 10.3109/00016489.2011.621145. Epub 2011 Nov 6.
This immunohistochemical study of estrogen and progesterone receptors could not confirm a significant expression in nasal telangiectasias. Thus, a specific effect of these hormones or anti-hormone therapy on malformed nasal vessels has to be questioned and only offered under strict clinical control.
The efforts to control recurrent epistaxis in hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT) using alternative methods are very intense. Hormone or anti-hormone therapy has frequently been postulated and the reported results are controversial. Therefore it was important to find an explanation regarding a possible impact of hormonal therapies by immunohistochemical evaluation of progesterone and estrogen receptor expression on nasal telangiectasias of affected patients.
Tissue samples of nasal mucosa with evidence of telangiectasias from 14 patients with HHT were analyzed for the expression of progesterone and estrogen receptors on the nuclei of endothelial cells of the malformed vessels using immunohistochemistry.
Progesterone receptors were not detected in any of the cases and only two cases showed a weak expression of estrogen receptors with an immunoreactive score of 2/12.
