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Thymidine phosphorylase and vascular endothelial growth factor in patients with Stage I lung adenocarcinoma
Author(s) -
Kojima Hiroshi,
Shijubo Noriharu,
Abe Shosaku
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
cancer
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.052
H-Index - 304
eISSN - 1097-0142
pISSN - 0008-543X
DOI - 10.1002/cncr.10352
Subject(s) - stromal cell , adenocarcinoma , medicine , angiogenesis , vascular endothelial growth factor , pathology , thymidine phosphorylase , basic fibroblast growth factor , cancer research , mast cell , oncology , cancer , immunology , growth factor , vegf receptors , receptor
BACKGROUND Thymidine phosphorylase (TP) has chemotactic activity in endothelial cells in vitro and angiogenic activity in vivo. However, the clinical significance of TP and cooperative roles of TP with other angiogenic factors have remained unclear in nonsmall cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC). METHODS The authors stained for TP, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), and basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) in 132 tumors from patients with Stage I NSCLC. They compared TP, VEGF, and bFGF expression levels with microvessel counts (MVCs), macrophage counts, mast cell counts, and clinical outcomes of patients with Stage I NSCLC. RESULTS In adenocarcinoma samples, only stromal cell‐TP expression and tumor cell‐VEGF expression were associated with MVCs and mast cell counts but not with macrophage counts. In squamous cell carcinoma samples, there were no significant associations of the expression of any examined angiogenic factors with MVCs, mast cell counts, or macrophage counts. More importantly, only among patients with Stage I adenocarcinoma of the lung did patients in the stromal cell‐TP positive tumor group and in the tumor cell‐VEGF positive tumor group have a significantly worse prognosis compared with patients in the stromal cell‐TP negative tumor group and in the tumor cell VEGF negative group, respectively. In addition, among patients with Stage I adenocarcinoma, patients in the stromal cell‐TP positive and tumor cell‐VEGF positive tumor group had a significantly worse prognosis among the four groups. CONCLUSIONS TP induction in tumoral stroma, but not in tumor cells, and tumor cell‐VEGF induction may promote angiogenesis cooperatively in adenocarcinoma of the lung. Stromal cell‐TP expression and tumor cell‐VEGF expression may be important prognostic factors in adenocarcinoma of the lung, and stromal cell‐TP expression may be a marker of active remodeling stroma in adenocarcinoma of the lung. Cancer 2002;94:1083–93. © 2002 American Cancer Society. DOI 10.1002/cncr.10352