Expression of p53 in preneoplastic and early neoplastic bronchial lesions

p53 alteration has been reported to be an early event in bronchial carcinogenesis. Our study purpose was to determine the rate of p53 expression in the various preneoplastic and early neoplastic bronchial lesions obtained by biopsy during fluorescence bronchoscopy and to analyse its association with patients characteristics. Various stages of preneoplastic lesions as well as radio-occult lung cancer were studied in biopsies obtained by fluorescence bronchoscopy. We assessed the expression of p53 by immunohistochemistry using monoclonal antibody clone DO7. The p53 expression was considered as positive if > or = 1% of cells were positive and the level of positivity was expressed in percentage of positive cells. Fourteen patients were included in each category of preneoplastic lesions. At the threshold of 1% of positive cells p53 expression was observed in 28.5% of the patients with a histologically normal epithelium. This number of positive patients increased with the severity of preneoplastic lesions and reached 100% in the mild dysplasia. The mean rates of p53 positive cells for normal epithelium, hyperplasia, metaplasia, mild and severe dysplasia, carcinoma in situ and invasive radio-occult carcinoma were respectively 0.9, 3.4, 9.1, 20.5, 50.2, 34.7 and 42.5%. There was no statistically significant correlation between p53 expression and patient characteristics such as sex, age, smoking habits and indication for fluorescence bronchoscopy. The alteration of p53 expression in patients with high risk of lung cancer was an early event: this abnormality increased with the severity of the lesions, without significant correlation with patient characteristics.