Expression Of PTEN And The Apoptosis Inhibitor Survivin In Basal Cell Carcinoma And Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Objective This study examined the expression of PTEN, a tumor suppressor protein, and Survivin, a novel inhibitor of apoptosis in basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma, to evaluate whether the expression of PTEN and Survivin is related to the malignancy of basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma and whether their expressions, alone and in combination, are associated with progression of basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinomaMethods Using immunohistochemical technique, we detected the expression of PTEN and Survivin in 20 cases of basal cell carcinoma ,40 cases of squamous cell carcinoma and 30 cases of normal skin. Of the 40 cases of squamous cell carcinoma, 21 cases were classified as grade I , 15 cases as grade II and 4 cases were classified as grade III, according to modified Border 's standard. Grade I and grade II were regarded as highly differentiated squamous cell carcinoma, and grade HI was regarded as poorly differentiated squamous cell carcinoma. Breast carcinoma specimens served as the postive control. Substitution of PBS for the primary antibody served as a negative control. Analyse the data with SPSS 10.0 system. Results The positive expression rate of PTEN in normal skin, basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma was 100%, 75% and 37.5% respectively. The positive expression rate of PTEN was lower in basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma than in normal skin, with a statistically significant difference (p<0.05 and p<0.001 respectively). The positive expression rate of PTEN was lower in squamous cell carcinoma than in basal cell carcinoma with a statistically significant difference (p<0.01). The positive expression rate of PTEN was decreased in squamous cell carcinoma from grade â…  to grade â…¡ and grade â…¢ with a statistically significant difference (p<0.001). The positive expression rate of Survivin in normal skin, basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma was 0, 55% and 67.5% respectively. The positive expression rate of Survivin was higher in basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma than in normal skin with a statistically significant difference (p<0.001, both). But there was no significant difference of Survivin expression between basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma (p>0.05). Among all the 60 cases of basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma, PTEN and Survivin were all expression in 9 cases, and were all negative in 1 case. The expression of PTEN was inversely correlated with that of Survivin with a statistically significant difference (r =-0.692,p=0.001). Conclusion PTEN was down regulated in basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma,...