P53 EXPRESSION IN STAGE III-IV SQUAMOUS-CELL CARCINOMA OF THE LARYNX - AN IMMUNOHISTOCHEMICAL STUDY RELATED TO CLINICOPATHOLOGICAL, FLOW-CYTOMETRIC DNA ANALYSIS AND PROGNOSIS

A series of 71 patients undergoing radical surgical resection for stag e III and IV laryngeal carcinoma (LC) consecutively diagnosed was pros pectively studied in order to evaluate the relative weight of p53 expr ession in predicting clinical outcome, All the patients taking part in this study were followed up for a median of 18 months (range: 6-41 mo nths). Positive staining for p53 protein was detected in 44 of 71 (62% ) of these tumors on paraffin-embedded tissue, even in dysplastic area s. Among the clinico-pathological and biological parameters analyzed, only flow-cytometric S-phase (FCM-S) Values of turners showed a signif icant relationship to p53 immunostaining (p=0.01). With Kaplan-Meier e stimation, in multivariate analysis only high FCM-S (>15.1) was indepe ndently related to risk of relapse (RR=5.82), while both FCM-S and sit e (subglottis) were related to risk of death (RR=6.83 and RR=14.3, res pectively). These findings indicate that p53 immunoreactivity, though of no utility as a prognostic indicator, probably plays a role in the early stages of LC tumorigenesis.