Overexpression of the 67 kD Laminin Receptor Correlates with the Progression of Gastric Carcinoma

Abstract

This retrospective study was designed to investigate the relationship between overexpression of the 67 kD laminin receptor (67LR) using immunohistochemistry, and several clinicopathological parameters including overall survival in human gastric adenocarcinoma. We stained paraffin-embedded sections of 93 resected primary gastric adenocarcinomas using a polyclonal antibody specific for the 67LR as well as monoclonal antibodies for p53 protein, epidermal growth factor receptor, proliferating cell nuclear antigen, carcinoembryonic antigen and chromagranin. The results showed statistically significant correlations between overexpression of the 67LR and types of early or advanced gastric carcinoma (p < 0.001), depth of invasion (p < 0.001), WHO histopathologic classification (p < 0.001), stage (p = 0.001), expression of p53 protein (p = 0.019), expression of epidermal growth factor receptor (p < 0.001) and proliferating cell nuclear antigen labeling index (p = 0.002). A lower proportion of signet ring cells revealed a higher percentage of overexpression of 67LR in both early (p < 0.002) and advanced (p < 0.001) gastric carcinomas. Intestinal type adenocarcinoma (according to Lauren's classification) revealed a higher percentage of overexpression of the 67LR than the diffuse type in both early (p = 0.057) and advanced (p < 0.001) gastric carcinomas. The correlations between overexpression of the 67LR and lymph node metastasis were statistically significant (p < 0.07). Although the overexpression of the 67LR tended to correlate with lower survival rates, the correlation was not statistically significant due to the limited sample size. Our data revealed that overexpression of the 67LR is correlated with the progression of gastric carcinoma. The expression of the 67LR may be important as one of the steps which determines invasiveness during the progression of cancer.