Evaluation of the expression of the intestinal stem cell marker (LRG5) and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) in esophageal adenocarcinomas (EAC) with and without Barrett Esophagus (BE) and in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) and to correlat them with clinicopathological data.
Materials and methods
Expression of the putative intestinal stem cell marker LgR5 and VEGF was analyzed immunohistochemically in 12 cases of BE, 12 cases of BE with dysplasia, 12 cases of EAC with BE, 18 cases of EAC without BE, and 20 cases of esophageal squamous-cell carcinomas.
Results
LgR5 was over-expressed in 50% of BE without dysplasia, in 82.3% of BE with dysplasia, 100% of EAC with and without BE. By contrast, LgR5 was found to be not overexpressed in any of ESCC. A significant correlation wasfound between LGR5 and lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis, depth of invasion and stage of the adenocarcinoma (p