Research on expression and importance of p53, p16 and VEGF-C in cervical cancer

To investigate the expression of p53, p16(INK4A) and VEGF-C proteins in cervical cancer and their clinical importance.

The expression of p53, p16(INK4A) and VEGF-C proteins in 125 cases of cervical sections were detected by two-step immunohistochemical EnVision method, and analyzed combined with the clinical and pathological data.

(1) The positive expression rates of p53, p16(INK4A) and VEGF-C proteins were 56.8%, 95.2% and 88%, respectively. (2) The positive expression rate of p53 protein was 75% in lymph node metastasis-positive cases and 48.24% in lymph node metastasis-negative cases (P<0.05). The presence of difference for positive significant p53 in squamous cell carcinoma and adenocarcinoma is intensively large (P<0.01), but its expression is not much influenced by age, degree of differentiation, parametric infiltration, vascular metastasis or clinical staging (P>0.05). (3) The p16(INK4A) expression in squamous cell carcinoma is 95.65%, and it is 93.94% in adenocarcinoma, the differential expression rates bears no statistically significant, but the strong expression of squamous cell carcinoma covers 55.43% of the total number of squamous cell carcinoma, while only 15.15% rates in adenocarcinoma (P<0.01). The p16(INK4A) protein expression was not significantly correlated to age, histological type, degree of differentiation, lymph node metastasis, parametric infiltration, vascular metastasis or clinical staging (P>0.05). (4) Among the cases of lymph node metastasis, there were 100% of VEGF-C-positive expression and 82.35% of VEGF-C-negative expression, and the difference was significant (P<0.05). Among the cases of vasculature-positive samples of cervical cancer, there were 98.4% of VEGF-C-positive expression; while among the vasculature-negative samples of cervical cancer, there were 76.27% of VEGF-C-positive expression; the difference was significant (P<0.01). VEGF-C protein expression was not significantly correlated to age, histological type, degree of differentiation, parametric infiltration or clinical staging (P>0.05).

The expression of some immune enzymes in cervical cancer has a reference value for early diagnosis and prognosis of cervical cancer, and has a certain guiding significance for development of the treatment program. However, a larger sample is needed for supporting the research of its significance.