• S Tamura, H Shiozaki, M Miyata, T Kadowaki, M Inoue, S Matsui, T Iwazawa, T Takayama, M Takeichi, and M Monden.
• Department of Surgery II, Osaka University Medical School, Japan.
• Br J Surg. 1996 Nov 1; 83 (11): 1608-14.

AbstractReduced expression of E-cadherin is associated with tumour invasiveness and metastasis. To elucidate whether E-cadherin expression correlates with clinical outcome in patients with oesophageal cancer, 62 patients were investigated immunohistochemically using an anti-E-cadherin monoclonal antibody (HECD-1). Eight patients had normal levels of expression in the tumour, 25 had tumours that expressed high levels (50 per cent or more tumour cells staining positive for E-cadherin) and 29 had tumours expressing low levels (less than 50 per cent of cells expressing E-cadherin). Patients with normally expressing tumours had a better prognosis at 3 years than those with low-expressing tumours (P < 0.05). Postoperative death was correlated significantly with lymphatic invasion, lymph node metastasis, E-cadherin expression and depth of invasion (P < 0.05). Furthermore, haematogenous recurrence was correlated with E-cadherin expression (rs = 0.38, P < 0.01) and blood vessel invasion (rs = 0.28, P < 0.05). These results suggest that evaluation of E-cadherin immunoreactivity may predict haematogenous recurrence and poor prognosis in patients with oesophageal cancer.

27 keywords...

hide…