Abstract
Over-expression of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) has been identified as a common feature associated with clinical outcome in many types of cancer, including squamous cell carcinoma of the oesophagus (SCCO). However, the clinical importance of EGFR over-expression in SCCO remains unsettled as conflicting results exist. Therefore we carried out the present meta-analysis of published studies for clarification. A total of 13 studies including 1,150 patients were enrolled. EGFR over-expression was positive in 722 of these cases. With EGFR over-expression, patients had higher depth of invasion, vascular invasion, and poor prognosis. However, expression had no relation with degree of differentiation, histological grade, lymph node metastasis, clinical stage or lymphatic invasion. EGFR over-expression is probably a valuable predictor for the T stage, vascular invasion and OS, and it could be used as a poor prognosis indicator for the esophageal SCC patients. Targeting therapy to EFGR should be considered to the combined treatment in SCCO.
Highlights
Squamous cell carcinoma of the oesophagus (SCCO) is one of the most aggressive malignant tumors in humans
Studies were included in the meta-analysis if they met the following criteria: (1) expression of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) was evaluated in the primary squamous cell carcinoma of the oesophagus (SCCO) tissue as opposed to sera or metastatic tissue or in tissue adjacent to the tumor; (2) the expression of EGFR was measured by immunohistochemistry (IHC) of protein only; (3) analysis of the association between EGFR expression and
Surgical operation, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy are the main treatments for SCCO
Summary
Squamous cell carcinoma of the oesophagus (SCCO) is one of the most aggressive malignant tumors in humans. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), its over-expression has been identified as a common feature of many types of cancer including SCCO, and its association with clinical outcome in patients with malignant diseases has been studied because of the roles of EGFR signaling in cell proliferation and anti-apoptosis, metastasis and angiogenesis (Woodburn., 1999). It seems to be noticeably interesting target for therapy, and this led us to wonder about its implication in SCCO patients and potential use as a therapeutic target in this pathology. The clinical importance of EGFR over-expression remains unsettled as the conflicting results still exist, so we carried out this meta-analysis of published studies to clarify it
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