Omoto Itaru, Matsumoto Masataka, Okumura Hiroshi, Uchikado Yasuto, Setoyama Tetsuro, Kita Yoshiaki, Owaki Tetsuhiro, Kijima Yuko, Shinchi Hiroyuki, Ishigami Sumiya, Ueno Shinichi, Natsugoe Shoji
Department of Digestive Surgery, Breast and Thyroid Surgery, Graduate School of Medicine, Kagoshima University, Kagoshima 890-8520, Japan.
Oncol Lett. 2014 Apr;7(4):1027-1032. doi: 10.3892/ol.2014.1823. Epub 2014 Jan 24.
Lymph node metastasis is one of the most important prognostic factors in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)-C and its receptor, VEGF receptor-3 (VEGFR-3), are key in the process of lymphangiogenesis. The present study immunohistochemically examined the expression of VEGF-C, VEGFR-3 and D2-40 in 119 patients with ESCC, and microlymphatic vessel density (MLVD) was calculated based on D2-40 expression counts. Positive expression of VEGF-C was found to correlate significantly with depth of tumor invasion, lymphatic invasion and lymph node metastasis (P<0.001, P<0.0001 and P<0.0001, respectively). Patients with deeper tumor invasion showed higher positivity of VEGFR-3 expression (P<0.05), while patients with lymph node metastasis showed higher MLVD (P<0.05). When patients were divided into three groups according to the expression of VEGF-C and VEGFR-3, patients with coexpression of VEGF-C and VEGFR-3 exhibited poorer prognosis and higher MLVD. The VEGF-C/VEGFR-3 axis is important in tumor lymphangiogenesis.
淋巴结转移是食管鳞状细胞癌（ESCC）最重要的预后因素之一。血管内皮生长因子（VEGF）-C及其受体VEGF受体-3（VEGFR-3）在淋巴管生成过程中起关键作用。本研究采用免疫组织化学方法检测了119例ESCC患者中VEGF-C、VEGFR-3和D2-40的表达，并根据D2-40表达计数计算微淋巴管密度（MLVD）。结果发现，VEGF-C的阳性表达与肿瘤浸润深度、淋巴管浸润及淋巴结转移显著相关（分别为P<0.001、P<0.0001和P<0.0001）。肿瘤浸润较深的患者VEGFR-3表达阳性率较高（P<0.05），而有淋巴结转移的患者MLVD较高（P<0.05）。根据VEGF-C和VEGFR-3的表达将患者分为三组，VEGF-C和VEGFR-3共表达的患者预后较差且MLVD较高。VEGF-C/VEGFR-3轴在肿瘤淋巴管生成中起重要作用。
