TUMOR ANGIOGENESIS IN STAGE-II COLORECTAL-CARCINOMA - ASSOCIATION WITH SURVIVAL

We studied the frequency of microvessels in T3 N0 M0 colorectal carcin omas from patients with widely different survival times. Microvessels (<50 mu m diameter) were enhanced by immunostaining with antibody to f actor VIII-related antigen and counted in 40x high-power fields in sec tions of resected carcinomas from 9 patients who died of disease in 24 months or less (short-term survivors) and 13 who had no evidence of d isease at 109 months or longer (long-term survivors). The means of the 10 highest counts for each case were compared between the long- and s hort-term survivor groups. The mean +/- SD microvessel count was 25.4 +/- 6.5 for the short-term survivors and 30.3 +/- 6.4 for the long-ter m survivors. Median counts were 27.2 and 29.4, respectively. The distr ibution of microvessel counts was skewed toward higher counts in the l ong-term survivors. There was no correlation between microvessel count s and tumor site, size, or grade; lymphovascular invasion; or the pres ence of a mucinous component. Although there was a trend toward a high er frequency of microvessels in patients with longer survival, it is u nlikely that microvessel count is an independent prognostic indicator for patients with T3 NO MO colorectal carcinoma because there is only a small difference in microvessel frequency between patients with wide ly different survival times.