The Tohoku journal of experimental medicine
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Tohoku J. Exp. Med. · Mar 1993
Prognostic significance of simultaneous infiltration of HLA-DR-positive dendritic cells and tumor infiltrating lymphocytes into human esophageal carcinoma.
The distribution of HLA-DR-positive dendritic cells (DR+DCs) and tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) was investigated in 67 patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the esophagus. DR+DCs were chiefly present among the cancer cell nests, and few were seen in the stroma. As clusters, UCHL-1-positive T-cells (UCHL1-Ts) were detected in the tissue around the cancer cell nests and as individual cells within tumor nests. ⋯ In addition, a few OPD4-positive helper/inducer T cells were found among cancer cells, and were densely present in the stroma. A correlation was demonstrated between the number of DR+DCs and UCHL1-Ts in each patient (R = 0.4547, p < 0.01). In addition, dense tumor infiltration by both DR+DCs and UCHL1-Ts within the cancer cell nests was related to a better prognosis (p < 0.01).