The Expression Of Maspin And Caspase-3 And Their Correlation In Cervical Carcinoma

Objective:This study was designed to observe the expression of Maspin and Caspase-3 and their association with pathological features in cervical carcinoma.The aim was to study their relationship with the development,evolution invasion and metastasis of the cancerous tissues and to demonstrate the potential use of Maspin as a diagnostic and therapeutic agent.Methods:The expression of Maspin and Caspase-3 was investigated using immunohistochemical staining in 75 cases,including 30 cases of normal cervical epithelia,10 cases of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia and 35 cervical carcinomas.The level of Maspin and Caspase-3 expression in 35 cervical carcinomas was analyzed against clinical pathological factors such as clinical stage and histological grade,Morover, Maspin expression in comparison with Caspase-3 expression was investigated preliminarily.Results:1.The percentage of Maspin positively expression decreased from normal cervical epithelia (76.7％) to cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (60.0%) to cervical carcinomas (42.5％),(P<0.05).Among them,there were statistically significant between normal cervical epithelia and cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (P<0.05)and between normal cervical epithelia and cervical carcinomas(P<0.05).But no statistically difference was found between cervical intraepithelial neoplasia and cervical carcinomas(P>0.05).2.The positive expression of Maspin was significantly associated with FIGO stage,but was irrelevant to age of patients,tumor shape,tumor size,pathological grade and type in cervical carcinomas.The positive rate of Maspin inⅠ～Ⅱstage was significantly higher than those inⅢ～Ⅳstage(P<0.05).3.The expression of Caspase-3 was 80.0％,40.0％,31.4％respectively in normal cervical epithelia, cervical intraepithelial neoplasia,cervical carcinomas.The positive expression was statistically difference between normal cervical epithelia and cervical intraepithelial neoplasia(P<0.05),between normal cervical epithelia and cervical carcinomas(P <0.05).However, there were no statistically significant between cervical intraepithelial neoplasia and cervical intraepithelial neoplasia(P>0.05).4.Statistically significant correlation was found between Caspase-3 and pathological grade.Caspase-3 was expressed significantly higher in high differentiation than low differentiation(P<0.05).There were no significant difference between Caspase-3 and other pathological features.5.The expression of Maspin was positive correlated with the expression of caspase-3 in cervical carcinomas (r_s=0.533,P<0.01).Conclusion:The expressions of Maspin and Caspase-3 were descended with the transformation from normal cervical epithelia to cervical intraepithelial neoplasia to cervical carcinomas. The level of Maspin was decreased with FIGO stage.The lower differentiation was,the level of Caspase-3 was concomitantly lower.Given these observations,we concluded that Maspin and Caspase-3 might play an important role in the development and evolution of cervical carcinomas.It was also found that the expression of Maspin was positive correlated with the expression of Caspase-3 in cervical carcinomas,which suggested Maspin might induce the apoptosis by increasing the effect of Caspase-3.