Relationship among expression of vascular endothelial growth factor-C(VEGF-C),it's recepror VEGFR-3 and lymphatic metastasis in tonguecancer

Objective To investigate the expression of vascular endotheliar growth factor-c(VEGF-C) and it's receptor VEGFR-3 in human tongue cancer.Methods Paraffin-embedded specimens from 62 patients with tongue cancer were examined by immunohistochemical staining.Results Positive immunohistochemical staining for VEGF-C was observed in 24 of all patients the positive ration was 38.7%.A significant positive correlation was found between VEGF-C in cancer cells and VEGFR-3 in vascular endothelial cells.Morphologically VEGFR-3 expression was detected in the endothelial cells of the stromal lymphatic vessels which located in the bound also called the cancer intravation region between the tumour islands and normal tissue.In this cohort of tongue cancer patients,VEGF-C expression was significantly associated with lymph node metastasis.Conclusion VEGF-C was mainly produced from cancer cells.These results strongly indicate that VEGF-C may induce the proliferation of lymphatic vessels in the stroma of tongue cancer via activiation of VEGFR-3,expressed on the endothelial cells of lymphatic vessels.In these circurnstances,cancer cells can easily invade the lymphatic vessels,because of the increase of the contact points of cancer cells with the lymphatic vessels.Then,cancer cells migrate into the regional lymph nodes,and proliferate there to form a metastasis.