Expression of Hypoxia-inducible Factor-1α and Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor C in Gastric Carcinoma and Correlation with Lymph Node Metastasis

Objective:The present studies aimed at studying the relationship between HIF-1α and VEGF-C expression and lymph node metastasis in gastric cancer tissues.Methods:Streptavidin-peroxidase(S-P) method was used for the immunohistochemical detection of HIF-1α and VEGF-C protein in paraffin embedded archival samples from 44 patients with gastric cancer and 20 normal gastric tissues.Results:Of the 44 gastric cancer 26 cases(59.1%) showed HIF-1α immunoreactivity in the cytoplasm of cancer cells.And 23 cases(52.27%) showed VEGF-C positive in cytoplasm and they were significantly higher than those in normal tissues(P0.05).Of the 44 gastric cancers 29 cases were lymph node metastasis;There were 21 cases that showed HIF-1α and 19 cases showed VEGF-C and they were significantly higher than those in no lymph node metastasis(P0.05);The expression of HIF-1α protein had significant positive correlation with the expression of VEGF-C protein in gastric cancers(rs=0.85,P0.05).Conclusions:The up regulated expression of HIF-1α and VEGF-C protein was observed in gastric cancer.the positive expression of HIF-1α and VEGF-C in gastric cancer may play an important role in the processes of carcinogenesis,invasion and metastasis.The positive expression of HIF-1α protein was significantly correlated with the positive expression of VEGF-C protein in gastric cancer.For predicting lymph node metastasis of gastric cancer,HIF-1α and VEGF-C are of some value.