Evaluation of the β Catenin Expression in the Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Objective: To evaluate the relationship between the catenin expression and the disease of oral squamous cell carcinoma. Materials and Methods: Fifty-two subjects who had received tumor ablative surgery and had complete medical records of the oral squamous cell carcinoma were selected from 2000 to 2002 in Buddhist Dalin Tzu Chi General Hospital, Taiwan. The expressions of catenin in these tumor cells were analyzed immunohistochemically. Results: The results show that the expressions of the catenin were slightly increased in these 52 cases. There were 28 cases (53.8%) which exhibited positive staining. After analyzing these data with Chi-square analysis, the expression of catenin was not statistically related to gender, site, tumor differentiation, cervical metastasis, clinical stages, distant metastasis, survival or personal habits (p＞0.05). Conclusions: This study shows that the expression of catenin was slightly increased in oral squamous cell carcinoma, but failed to show a specific relationship to the tumor progression.