High-level expression of HOXB13 is closely associated with tumor angiogenesis and poor prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma.

High-level expression of HOXB13 is closely associated with tumor angiogenesis and poor prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma. Int J Clin Exp Pathol. 2014;7(6):2925-33 Authors: Zhu JY, Sun QK, Wang W, Jia WD Abstract Homeobox B13 (HOXB13) is generally considered as a crucial regulator of terminal cellular differentiation. More recently, the absent or aberrant expression of HOXB13 has been increasingly implicated in cancer development and metastasis. However, the expression of HOXB13 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and its correlation with tumor angiogenesis and prognosis still remain unclear. The aim of the study was to evaluate the expression of HOXB13 in patients with HCC and explore the relationship of HOXB13 expression with clinicopathologic factors, tumor angiogenesis and prognosis. Immunohistochemistry was performed to determine the expression of HOXB13 in HCC and corresponding paracarcinomatous tissues from 72 patients. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and CD31 were only examined in tissues of HCC patients mentioned above. The results showed that HOXB13 expression was significantly (P <0.001) higher in HCC (69.4%) than that in surrounding non-tumor tissues (26.4%), positively correlated with tumor VEGF (P <0.001) and microvessel density (MVD) (P = 0.013). Besides, it was associated with tumor capsula (P <0.001), vascular invasion (P <0.001), Edmondson grade (P <0.001), AFP (P = 0.007) and TNM stage (P ...
Source: International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Pathology - Category: Pathology Authors: Tags: Int J Clin Exp Pathol Source Type: research