EXPRESSION OF NECTIN-4 IN OESOPHAGEAL CARCINOMA AND ITS CORRELATION WITH CLINICOPATHOLOGICAL FEATURES AND PROGNOSIS

Jia Wang*, Xuan Liang**, Xiao Fu**, Tao Tian**, #

*Department of Thoracic II, Beijing Cancer Hospital, Beijing, PR China - **Department of Oncology, the First Affiliated Hospital of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, PR China

Objective: To study the expression of Nectin-4 in oesophageal carcinoma and its correlation with clinicopathological features and prognosis. 

Methods: Eighty-four oesophageal cancer (EC) tissues and 30 normal paracancerous tissues were surgically removed between September 2017 and September 2018 in our hospital, and the Nectin-4 expression in those tissues was detected by immunohistochemistry to explore the correlation between the expression and clinicopathological features and prognosis. 

Results: The high expression rate of Nectin-4 in EC tissues was 75% (63/84), which was significantly higher than that in normal adjacent tissues (P<.05). The expression level in EC tissues may be correlated with tumour size and depth of invasion (P<.05) and not associated with age, gender, lymph node metastasis and AJCC stage (P>.05). The survival rate of patients who had high Nectin-4 expression was 15.87% (10/63), which was obviously lower than that of patients who had low Nectin-4 expression (38.33%) (8/21). Nectin-4 is an independent risk factor for the prognosis of EC patients; the depth of invasion and lymph node involvement may be other independent risk factors for the prognosis of EC patients. 

Conclusion: Nectin-4 is involved in the development of EC, and its high expression indicates a poor prognosis, which is related to the clinicopathological characteristics of tumour size and depth of invasion. Nectin-4 can be used as an important risk factor for evaluating the prognosis of EC patients and is expected to become an important molecular target for treatment.