Expressions of Ki-67 and nm23 in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma and their clinical significance

Objective: To study the relationship between expression of Ki-67,nm23 and differentiation,invasiveness and metastasis in human esophageal squamous cell carcinoma,and the correlation between expression of Ki-67 and nm23.Methods: Expression of Ki-67 and nm23 in 175 patients with squamous cell carcinoma of esophagus were detected by using immunohistochemical SP methods.Results: Ninety-eight cases(56.0%) and 137 cases(78.3%) with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma were positive in the examination of Ki-67 protein and nm23 protein,respectively.The expression of Ki-67 protein was related to lymph nodes metastasis and TNM stage of esophageal carcinoma(P0.05).The patients with lymph node metastasis had very higher expression of Ki-67(75.7%) but the patients with out lymph node metastasis had lower expression(24.3%).The expression of Ki-67 protein was high in the higher stage of esophageal carcinoma.The expression of nm23 was related to lymph node metastasis(P0.05).The expression of nm23 was lower in patients with lymph node metastasis(42.9%)but was higher in patients with out lymph node metastasis negative(83.6%).There was corretalion between low expression of Ki-67 and the high expression of nm23.Conclusions: High expression of Ki-67 and low expression of nm23 play an important role in the progression of squamous cell carcinoma of esophagus.Ki-67 and nm23 may be a gene marker in the prediction of patients prognosis.