ASSESSMENT OF THE PROLIFERATIVE ACTIVITY OF SUPERFICIAL ESOPHAGEAL-CARCINOMA USING MIB-1 IMMUNOSTAINING FOR THE KI-67 ANTIGEN

Background and Objectives: Lymph node metastasis or vascular invasion may occur in superficial esophageal squamous cell carcinoma when it in vades to or into the muscularis mucosae. Therefore, the correlation be tween histopathological characteristics and the proliferative activity of superficial esophageal carcinoma was investigated. Methods: Thirty -eight cases of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, including 14 cases of mucosal carcinoma and 24 cases of submucosal carcinoma, who underw ent surgical resection without preoperative treatment, were studied us ing monoclonal antibody MIB-1 for the Ki-67 antigen immunohistochemica lly. The labeling index (LI) was calculated with a computed image anal yzer. Results: The LI of MIB-1 at the invasive tip of m(3) carcinoma w as significantly higher than that of m(1) or m(2) carcinoma (P < 0.01) . The LI at the invasive tip was significantly higher than that at the core of sm(2) (P < 0.05) and submucosal carcinoma overall (P < 0.01). The LI values at both the invasive tip and core of poorly differentia ted carcinoma in submucosal carcinoma were higher than that of well or moderately differentiated carcinoma with a significant difference (P < 0.05). The LI at the invasive tip of submucosal carcinoma with lymph node metastasis or lymphatic invasion was significantly higher than t hat without them (P < 0.05). Conclusion: Proliferative activities of c ancer cells in superficial esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, immunos taining with the MIB-1, were related to the depth of invasion, differe ntiation, lymph node metastasis, and lymphatic invasion with a signifi cant difference. (C) 1998 Wiley-Liss, Inc.