Background
To find the relationship between prostaglandin E receptor 2 (EP2) and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) patients with regional lymph nodes metastasis (pN+) who had undergone curative resection, and to analyze them in the role of judging prognosis.
Conclusions
The expression of EP2 and EGFR were high in tumor tissues of (pN+) ESCC, and they are playing a key role in the prognosis of ESCC patients with local lymph node metastases.
Methods
Sixty-three patients with ESCC who underwent attempted curative esophagectomy with lymph node metastasis were collected. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) was used to analyse the expression of EP2 and EGFR in tumor tissues. We analyzed the relationship between the two markers. Furthermore, we analyzed the role of EP2 and EGFR in disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS).
Results
The expression rate of EP2 and EGFR in this study were 73.0%, 85.7%, respectively. And the EP2 status was closely related with the expression of EGFR in tumor tissues (χ2=0.260, P=0.011). The patients with EP2 or EGFR positive expression had a shorter DFS and OS than the negative group. Further analysis found EGFR is an important prognostic factor for DFS and OS (P<0.001), the expression of EP2 was related with PFS (P=0.048), but it was not an independent influencing factors for OS (P>0.05). Conclusions: The expression of EP2 and EGFR were high in tumor tissues of (pN+) ESCC, and they are playing a key role in the prognosis of ESCC patients with local lymph node metastases.