Correlation of protein P16 expression with histologic types and prognosis of ovarian cancer

Objective: To detect the expression of protein P16 in 58 cases of ovarian cancer, study its clinic significance and the function of protein P16 in ovary carcinogenesis. Methods: The expression of protein P16 in human ovarian cancer tissue was observed with immunohistochemical method and streptavidin peroxdase conjugataed method. Results: The expression of protein P16 was related to histologic types of ovarian cancer( P 0.05), the differences in positive rate were found mainly between adenocarcinoma and border line tumor; the former was lower. It was related closely to lymph nodal and great omental metastases( P 0.01), the positive rate of primary sites in patiants with metastases was lower than those who had no metastases; but there was no difference in positive rate between primary sites and metastases( P 0.05). The expression was also related to the survival time after operation( P 0.05). Conclusion: Protein P16 may play an important role in human ovary carcinogenesis. The expression of protein P16 in ovarian tumor tissue may serve as one of assessable factors for prognosis in patients with ovarian carcinoma. [