[Flow cytometric cell cycle analysis using a monoclonal antibody to bromodeoxyuridine on gastric cancers]

Flow cytometric cell cycle analysis using a monoclonal antibody to Bromodeoxyuridine was performed on 117 gastric cancers. Dissociated cells were stained with indirect immunostaining for BrdU (FITC-BrdU) and propidium iodide. Bivariate BrdU/DNA distribution were obtained using EPICS-C flow cytometry. Tumor ploidy was classified as follows, D1: diploidy, D2: diploidy + aneuploidy, A1: single aneuploidy, A2: multiple aneuploidies. The ploidies of noncancerous gastric mucosa were all diploidy and that of S-phase fraction(SPF) were ranged from 0.0% to 1.2%. In 117 gastric cancers, aneuploidy was observed in 80 cases, D2: 38, A1: 15, A2: 27. SPF was higher in aneuploidy (14.5 +/- 5.1%) than diploidy (6.1 +/- 5.1%). Significant differences were observed between that of D1 (6.1 +/- 2.5) and D2 (13.6 +/- 6.2), A1 (12.5 +/- 4.5), A2 (16.0 +/- 3.2), and A1 and A2 (p less than 0.01). The patients with aneuploid tumors had poor prognosis than diploid tumors (p less than 0.05). In concerned with DNA ploidy pattern, the patients with A2 had most poor prognosis than the other (p less than 0.05). Furthermore, the patients with SPF over 10% had poor prognosis than that of SPF below 10%. These results indicated that DNA ploidy pattern and SPF may possibly be useful prognostic markers for gastric cancers.