Fuyuhiro Yuhiko, Yashiro Masakazu, Noda Satoru, Kashiwagi Shinichiro, Matsuoka Junko, Doi Yosuke, Kato Yukihiro, Muguruma Kazuya, Sawada Tetsuji, Hirakawa Kosei
Department of Surgical Oncology, and.
Exp Ther Med. 2010 Jul;1(4):547-551. doi: 10.3892/etm_00000086. Epub 2010 Jul 1.
Fibroblasts, particularly myofibroblasts, affect the malignant progression of cancer cells in vitro. However, to date few reports have addressed the clinical significance of myofibroblasts in the gastric cancer microenvironment. This study examined the correlation between myofibroblast expression and clinicopathological features in gastric carcinoma. A total of 265 primary gastric tumors resected by gastrectomy were stained with antibodies against α-smooth muscle actin and vimentin. Stromal cells positive for vimentin were considered to be fibroblasts. Myofibroblasts were defined as fibroblasts positive for α-smooth muscle staining. Myofibroblast-positive gastric carcinoma was established when myofibroblasts accounted for more than 25% of fibroblasts in the cancer stroma. Myofibroblast expression was positive in 92 (35%) of the 265 gastric carcinomas. Myofibroblast expression showed a significantly (p<0.001) high frequency in advanced gastric cancers (76 of 146), in comparison to the early stage cancers (16 of 119). Taken together, there was a statistically significant correlation between myofibroblast expression and scirrhous type gastric cancer (p<0.001), lymph node metastasis (p<0.001), lymphatic invasion (p<0.001) and peritoneal dissemination (p=0.005). The prognosis of patients with tumors positive for myofibroblast expression was significantly (p<0.001) worse, while a multivariate analysis revealed that myofibroblast expression was not an independent prognostic factor. These findings suggest that myofibroblasts are associated with scirrhous gastric cancer. Overexpression of myofibroblasts may therefore be a useful prognostic indicator of gastric carcinoma.
成纤维细胞，尤其是肌成纤维细胞，在体外会影响癌细胞的恶性进展。然而，迄今为止，很少有报告探讨肌成纤维细胞在胃癌微环境中的临床意义。本研究检测了胃癌中肌成纤维细胞表达与临床病理特征之间的相关性。对265例接受胃切除术切除的原发性胃肿瘤用抗α平滑肌肌动蛋白和波形蛋白的抗体进行染色。波形蛋白阳性的基质细胞被认为是成纤维细胞。肌成纤维细胞被定义为α平滑肌染色阳性的成纤维细胞。当肌成纤维细胞占癌基质中成纤维细胞的25%以上时，即确定为肌成纤维细胞阳性的胃癌。在265例胃癌中，92例（35%）肌成纤维细胞表达呈阳性。与早期胃癌（119例中的16例）相比，肌成纤维细胞表达在进展期胃癌（146例中的76例）中显示出显著较高的频率（p<0.001）。综合来看，肌成纤维细胞表达与硬癌型胃癌（p<0.001）、淋巴结转移（p<0.001）、淋巴管浸润（p<0.001）和腹膜播散（p=0.005）之间存在统计学上的显著相关性。肌成纤维细胞表达阳性的肿瘤患者的预后明显较差（p<0.001），而多因素分析显示肌成纤维细胞表达不是一个独立的预后因素。这些发现表明肌成纤维细胞与硬癌型胃癌有关。因此，肌成纤维细胞的过表达可能是胃癌的一个有用的预后指标。
