Expression of PTEN protein in hepatocellular carcinoma and its significance

Objective To detect the expression of PTEN protein in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) to determine whether it can be used as a new molecular label for evaluation of biological characteristics of HCC. Methods The expression of PTEN protein was immunohistochemically determined in histological specimens from 43 patients with HCC and 5 controls. Meanwhile, the relation of PTEN expression to clinical pathological characteristics of HCC was explored. Results PTEN expression was significantly stronger in para-neoplastic liver tissue than in the tumor tissue (P0. 05). There was marked difference in the expression between HCC with various characteristics of Edmond-son stages, vein invasion or preoperative Child classification (P0. 05). HCC with higher differentiation, no vain invasion and grade A showed remarkably stronger PTEN expression (P0. 05). The solitary large HCC was stronger in PTEN expression than the multinodular one. No significant difference in the expression was found between the small HCC and solitary large HCC. Conclusions PTEN expression might be used a molecular label to determine biological characteristics of HCC. The results of PTEN expression determination indicates that solitary large HCC might show better prognosis than multinodular HCC.