Clinical and biological significance of angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis in colorectal cancer

Abstract

Background. Angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis are essential for tumour development and progression. However, in colorectal cancer (CRC), the relationship between angiogenesis and clinic outcome is controversial, and the prognostic significance of lymphangiogenesis is not well examined because of the lack of specific marker for lymphatic vessels. Aims.To evaluate blood microvessel density (MVD) following the proposed standard method for MVD assessment given by the first international consensus and lymph vessel density (LVD), and investigate their clinicopathologic and biologic significance in CRC.Methods. MVD and LVD in primary tumours (n = 210), along with their corresponding adjacent normal mucosa (n = 105) and distant normal mucosa (n = 27) specimens, were immunohistochemically examined by using CD31 and D2-40 antibodies.Results. Both MVD and LVD were higher in tumour compared with the corresponding normal mucosa. In tumours, MVD was positively related to particular interesting new cysteine-histidine-rich protein (PINCH) expression (P = 0.006), but not with clinicopathologic variables. LVD, in both intratumoural and peritumoural areas of tumours, was reversely related to Dukes' stage. There was no association between MVD or LVD and patients' survival (P > 0.05). Conclusions. Angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis occurred in CRC development, butwere not related to CRC patient prognosis. PINCH may play a potential role in tumour angiogenesis.

Clinical significance of lymph vessel density in T3 colorectal carcinoma

“…The use of a specific lymphatic endothelial marker as D2-40 allows an accurate identification of the lymphatics, avoiding the misinterpretation of blood microvessels as lymphatics. We found a significant difference between PLVD and ILVD with a higher PLVD, in accordance with other reports [23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33] with the exception of the study of Longatto-Filho et al [34]. Moreover, the morphology of lymphatics is different between the two areas, i.e.…”

Inhibition of STAT3 by RNA interference suppresses angiogenesis in colorectal carcinoma

“…Numerous lines of evidence have shown that angiogenesis, as quantitated according to MVD, which can reflect the status of angiogenesis in tumor tissue, plays a significant clinicopathologic role in cancer patients (34,35). In CRC, MVD is an important, highly significant and accurate prognostic factor (36,37). The MVD method, i.e., counting microvessels in hot spots, has been the preferred method (25).…”

Macrophage Infiltration in Tumor Stroma is Related to Tumor Cell Expression of CD163 in Colorectal Cancer

“…Serial sections of 5 μm were cut from formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue blocks, deparaffinized in xylene and hydrated in a series of graded alcohols (100 %, 95 %, and 70 %). The sections were stained with CD163, CD31 and D2-40 antibodies according to methods used in our previous studies [27,40,41,28].…”