Korean J Otolaryngol-Head Neck Surg.  2002 Oct;45(10):980-983.

Prognostic Significance of the Microvessel Density in Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma

• Lim SC
• Cho JS
• Na AS
• Kim PS
• Cho HH
• Moon SJ

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The nasopharyngeal cancer (NPC) of nasopharyngeal neoplasms is a rare disease with a relatively poor prognosis, because they tend to be diagnosed in the far advanced stage. Therefore, radiotherapy had been the treatment of choice. Angiogenesis is a crucial step in the tumor growth and progression. The authors attempted to investigate the prognostic value of the microvessel density in NPC.
SUBJECTS AND METHOD
We analyzed tumor tissues from 57 cases of paraffin block specimens which had been diagnosed with NPC and treated at Chonnam National University Hospital. The anti-human von Willebrand factor antibody was used to determine the microvessel density (MVD).
RESULTS
The MVD was 48.5 in the early stage (stage I and II) and 51.2 in the advanced stage (stage III and IV), which were not statistically significant (p=0.057). The MVD was 55.3 in type I, 54.4 in type II, and 41.8 in type III, and there were no statistical significance between these values (p=0.36). The MVD was not statistically significant between T and N stages (p=0.26, 0.42). There was no significance between the MVD and the survival rates (p>0.05).
CONCLUSION
The results suggest that the MVD was not a prognostic significance in NPC.

Keyword

Nasopharyngeal neoplasms; Von Willebrand factor; Prognosis

MeSH Terms

Jeollanam-do
Microvessels*
Nasopharyngeal Neoplasms
Paraffin
Prognosis
Radiotherapy
Rare Diseases
Survival Rate
von Willebrand Factor
Paraffin
von Willebrand Factor