Mutant p53 in patients with invasive cervical cancer stages IB to IIB

The present study evaluates the prognostic value of mutant p53 protein overexpression in 109 surgically treated cervical cancer stages IB to IIB. Squamous cell carcinoma stages IB, IIA, and IIB were present in 52, 13, and 44 cases, respectively. We performed immunohistochemistry using a monoclonal antibody against the p53 suppressor gene product (clone BP53-12). Data were analyzed for the end points of disease-free survival and overall survival. In 109 tissue specimens we detected 22 cases of p53 expression. Six of 22 patients with p53 expression and 21 of 87 patients without p53 expression showed tumor recurrences. p53 expression showed no significant correlation to age, tumor stage or lymph node involvement. In the univariate analysis p53 expression showed no prognostic value for disease-free (P = 0.5) and overall survival (P = 0.6). Multivariate analysis showed a significant prognostic value for established prognostic parameters while p53 expression had no prognostic value for recurrence-free (P = 0.6) and overall survival (P = 0.5). In contrast to other malignancies mutant p53 overexpression showed no relation to prognosis in surgically treated cervical cancer stage IB to IIB.