Devi Anju, Keerthika R, Kamboj Mala, Narwal Anjali
Department of Oral Pathology and Microbiology, Pt. Bhagwat Dayal Sharma University of Health Sciences, Post Graduate Institute of Dental Sciences (PGIDS), Rohtak, Haryana, India.
Department of Oral Pathology and Microbiology, Banaras Hindu University, Faculty of Dental Sciences, Trauma Centre, Institute of Medical Sciences, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India.
Sultan Qaboos Univ Med J. 2025 May 2;25(1):74-82. doi: 10.18295/2075-0528.1008. eCollection 2025.
Intratumoural budding (ITB) is an emerging entity in oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) and serves as a prime histopathological predictor of aggressive potential. This study aimed to investigate the incidence of ITB in OSCC due to its limited representation in the literature.
This retrospective study was conducted in the Department of Oral Pathology and Microbiology, Post Graduate Institute of Dental Sciences, Rohtak, India, between 2017 and 2021. A total of 73 haematoxylin and eosin-stained sections of various grades of OSCC were examined for ITB and tumour-associated macrophages (TAMs), focusing on correlating these findings with clinicopathological parameters. Immunohistochemical analysis using a cluster of differentiation 68 (CD68) was performed. Additionally, the expression of CD68+ TAMs was studied in the centre of the tumour mass and correlated with ITB to ascertain the biological behaviour of OSCC. The data obtained were analysed using chi-square and Pearson correlation tests ( < 0.05).
ITB significantly increased in higher histopathological grades of OSCC ( = 0.000). Conversely, CD68+ TAMs in OSCC decreased significantly as the histopathological grades increased ( = 0.000), whereas on correlating with ITB, a non-significant difference was observed, revealing a negative correlation (r = -0.149; = 0.208).
The inverse association between ITB and TAMs with increasing histopathological grades may help identify ITB as a precise histopathological parameter for evaluating the aggressive biological potential in OSCC. Additionally, this relationship suggests the involvement of the anti-tumour immune response of TAMs within tumour mass.
肿瘤内芽生（ITB）是口腔鳞状细胞癌（OSCC）中一个新出现的实体，是侵袭潜能的主要组织病理学预测指标。由于其在文献中的报道有限，本研究旨在调查OSCC中ITB的发生率。
本回顾性研究于2017年至2021年在印度罗塔克牙科学院口腔病理学和微生物学系进行。共检查了73例不同分级的OSCC苏木精和伊红染色切片中的ITB和肿瘤相关巨噬细胞（TAM），重点是将这些结果与临床病理参数相关联。使用分化簇68（CD68）进行免疫组织化学分析。此外，研究了肿瘤块中心CD68+TAM的表达，并与ITB相关联，以确定OSCC的生物学行为。使用卡方检验和Pearson相关检验（<0.05）对获得的数据进行分析。
在组织病理学分级较高的OSCC中，ITB显著增加（=0.000）。相反，随着组织病理学分级的增加，OSCC中的CD68+TAM显著减少（=0.000），而与ITB相关联时，观察到无显著差异，显示出负相关（r=-0.149；=0.208）。
随着组织病理学分级增加，ITB与TAM之间的负相关可能有助于将ITB确定为评估OSCC侵袭性生物学潜能的精确组织病理学参数。此外，这种关系表明肿瘤块内TAM的抗肿瘤免疫反应参与其中。
