Determination of the prognostic significance of unscheduled cyclin A overexpression in patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.

The expression of cyclin A protein was retrospectively investigated in 124 patients with human esophageal squamous cell carcinoma with immunohistochemical techniques using antibody to cyclin A protein (BF683). Of 124 tumors, 49 (39.5%) exhibited positive staining in cancer cells with this antibody. Staining was observed predominantly but not exclusively in the nucleus. A significantly higher degree of association of immunoreactivity with this antibody was detected for advanced types of tumors (stages I, II, III, and IV) than for early tumors (stage 0; P < 0.05). Patients with cyclin A immunopositivity had a significantly poorer survival rate than did other patients (P < 0.01). These findings provide the first evidence for frequent and unscheduled overexpression of cyclin A protein in human esophageal cancer and suggest the possibility that alteration of cyclin A overexpression is associated with tumor progression and patient prognosis for esophageal cancers.