A Study On The Expression Of PRL,PRL-R,GH In Human Uterine Leiomyoma

Objective:Uterine leiomyoma are the most common benign tumor in femal genital tract. Steroids hormone are promoters of leiomyoma growth. Recently,investigators have suggested that some peptide growth factors and their receptors maybe important in regulation of leiomyoma growth.The aims of this study were to study localization and expression of prolactin(PRL), prolactin receptor(PRL-R)and growth hormone(GH)in uterine leiomyoma. Methods:In this study,leiomyoma and adjacent myometrial tissues were obstained from eighty patients undergoing hysterectomy for symptomatic leiomyomas. All patients were premenopausal and had no history of hormone treatment within three months.The expression of PRL, PRL-R, GH in eighty cases were examined by immunohistochemical technique, including 47cases of proliferative phase and 33 cases of secretory phase of menstrual cycle,named as group A and B respectively.A positive reaction was recorded when cells showed a brown granular staining of the cytoplasm and at least 5% of the smooth muscle cells showed a brown granular staining of the cytoplasm. The relactionships among expression of PRL, PRL-R, GH were analyzed.The results as follow: 1 .The expression of PRLBoth leiomyoma and myometrium cells were positive for PRL in the groupA and B.The expression level of PRL in leiomyoma of group A and B were significantly higher than that in the corresponding myometrium (P<0.01) ,but no difference was seen between groupA and B both in leiomyoma and myometrium (p>0.05) .The results suggested that prolactin was a growth factor for human myometrial and leiomyoma cells.PRL secretion showed no correlation to thephase of the endometrium(proliferative,secretory) . The overexpression of PRL in leiomyoma maybe promote proliferation of leiomyoma cells. 2. The expression of PRL-R:Both leiomyoma and myometrium cells were positive for PRL-R in the group A and B.The expression level of PRL-R varied widely between leiomyoma and myometrial (P<0.01) ,and showed no correlation to the phase of the endometrium (p> 0.05) . The expression level of PRL-R in leiomyoma was higher than in myometrium.There was no significant difference of PRL-R expression level between group Aand B.The result suggested that PRL-R was a growth factor for human myometrial and leiomyoma cells and PRL-R may increase the growth of leiomyoma. 3.The expression of GHGH was positive in both leiomyoma and myometrium cells.The expression level of GH in leiomyoma were significantly higher than that in the corresponding myometrium (P< 0.01) .There was no significant difference of GH expression level between group Aand B.The results suggested that uterine was also a site of GH action. The expression level of GH in leiomyoma was more higher than myometrium.lt suggested that GH play an important role in the growth of leiomyoma. 4 The correlation among the expression of PRL^ PRL-RandGHThe expression of PRL was positively and significantly correlated with that of PRL-R in myometrium of all groups (P< 0.01) .while in leiomyoma,there was no correlation between PRL and PRL-R.The results indicated that the imbalance of the expression of PRL/PRL-R leads to the growth of leiomyoma.No correlation between GH and PRL. The expression of GH was correlated with that of PRL-R in leiomyoma and myometrium.The results may indicated that PRL-R could be influenced by GH.