Expression and clinical significance of E-Cadherin in human breast cancer

Objective To study the expression of E-Cadherin and analyze the relationship between E-Cadherin expression and the clinicopathological features of human breast cancer.Methods Immunohistochemical technique [streptavid-in-peroxidase (SP) method] was applied to detect the expression of E-Cadherin in 110 cases of breast cancer tissue specimens,and the relationship between E-Cadherin expression and the clinicopathological features was retrospectively analyzed.Results The positive rate of E-Cadherin in all cases was 59.1％,and its expression level was lower in the young patients than in the older patients (42.9％ vs.64.6％,x2 =4.736,P ＜ 0.05％).The expression of E-cadherin was negatively correlated with the histological grades and human epidermalgrowth factor receptor-2 (Her-2) expression in breast cancer tissues (rs =-0.279,P ＜ 0.05 ; rs =-0.311,P ＜ 0.05).Lymph node metastasis rate was significantly higher in E-cadherin negative expression cases than in positive expression ones (75.6％ vs.35.4％,x2 =17.187,P ＜0.05).The 5-years survival rate in the E-Cadherin positive cases was increased evidently as compared with the negative E-Cadherin ones (76.9％ vs.40.0％).Conclusion The expression of E-cadherin may provide some reference to assess the biological characteristics and prognosis of breast cancer. Key words: Breast cancer;  E-Cadherin