Expression and significance of bcl-2 protein in esophageal squamous cell cancer and the surrounding tissues

Objective To study the expression and significance of bcl-2 protein in esophageal squamous cell cancer and the surrounding tissues.Methods EnVision method was used to analyze the expression of bcl-2 protein in tissues of esophageal squamous cell cancer and the surrounding tissues from 62 patients.Results Expressions rates of bcl-2 protein were 80.3 ％ (49/61),45.9 ％ (28/61) and 67.7 ％ (20/62) in simple hyperplasia,high grade intraepithelial neoplasia and squamous cell carcinoma tissues,respectively,but 3.3 ％ (1/30) in normal mucosa tissue.There were significant differences between normal esophageal mucosa group and other groups (x2 =54.437,P ＜ 0.01).The expression of bcl-2 had no differentiation in tissue differentiation grade and degree of invasion of carcinoma (x2 =0.219,x2 =5.878,P ＞ 0.05).But it had significant relationship between the expression of bcl-2 and lymph node metastasis (x2 =4.120,P ＜ 0.05).Conclusion bcl-2 may predicting the occurrence of esophageal squamous cell cancer in early stage,and may be regarded as an useful index for prognosis. Key words: Esophageal neoplasms; Neoplasms, squamous cell; Immunohistochemistry; bcl-2