Expression of caveolin-2 in patients with oral cancer and correlations with clinicopathological parameters

Abstract

We aimed to analyze the expression of caveolin-2 (CAV2) in patients with oral cancer and its correlations with clinicopathological parameters.The expression of CAV2 in oral cancer and its influence on the survival curves of oral cancer patients were inquired through the Human Protein Atlas Database. The cancer tissue specimens and normal paracancerous tissue specimens (?2 cm away from cancer tissues) were collected from 173 patients with oral cancer confirmed by pathology. Moreover, real-time quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) and immunohistochemistry were performed to detect the messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) and protein expressions of CAV2 in oral cancer tissues and corresponding paracancerous tissues, respectively, and their associations with the clinicopathological characteristics and survival conditions of oral cancer patients were analyzed.It was shown in the Human Protein Atlas Database that the expression of CAV2 was increased significantly in oral cancer tissues compared with that in normal tissues (P<0.05), and patients with a low expression of CAV2 had a longer survival time than those with a high expression of CAV2 (P<0.05). The results of qRT-PCR and immunohistochemistry manifested that the mRNA expression level of CAV2 and the percentage of CAV2-positive cells were significantly higher in oral cancer tissues than those in paracancerous tissues (P<0.05). The CAV2 expression was correlated with clinical stage and pathological differentiation degree (P<0.05). In comparison with those in patients with a low CAV2 expression, the overall survival (OS) curve, relapse-free survival (RFS) curve and survival rate declined significantly in patients with a high CAV2 expression (P=0.001). Besides, the CAV2 expression, clinical stage and pathological differentiation degree were independent influencing factors for the postoperative OS and RFS of patients. The expression of CAV2 had relatively high predictive value for the OS and RFS of patients with oral cancer within 5 years after operation, of which the area under curve was 0.827 and 0.874, and the optimal cut-off value was 27.97% and 32.84%, respectively.CAV2 is highly expressed in oral cancer. With rising CAV2 expression level, the survival time of patients is shortened and the relapse risk is elevated, suggesting a poor prognosis.