[Expression of vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 3 in human breast cancer and its significance]

To investigate the expression and prognostic value of vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 3 (VEGFR-3) in human breast cancer.

A tissue microarray containing cores was constructed from 173 female patients with primary breast cancers (experimental group) and 19 female patients with benign breast lesions (control group) between March 2004 and June 2007. HE staining was performed to determine the quality of tissue microarray and immunohistochemistry staining was used to detect VEGFR-3 expression in the tissue microarray. Statistical analysis was performed to show the association between VEGFR-3 expression and clinicopathologic parameters.

Histological examination showed that the tissue microarray had good quality, which could represent the histological characteristics of breast cancer and benign breast lesions. VEGFR-3 was expressed in 55.5% (96/173) breast cancer patients of experimental group, while the expression was negative in lesions of control group. VEGFR-3 expression rate had no significant relation with age, estrogen receptor, and progesterone receptor (P > 0.05). VEGFR-3 expression rate correlated positively with tumor size and pathological staging compared to VEGFR-3 negative tumors (P < 0.05). The positive expression rate of VEGFR-3 in breast cancer with lymph node metastasis was significantly higher than that without lymph node metastasis (P < 0.05). Furthermore, VEGFR-3 positive staining correlated with human EGF receptor 2 expression (P < 0.05).

The expressions of VEGFR-3 in human breast cancer have close relations with lymph node metastasis. Thus, VEGFR-3 may be a potential prognostic indicator and a new anti-cancer target for breast cancer.