Recently many molecular biologic techniques have been tried to determine a progdnostic indicastor in various malignancies by evaluating the capacity of cellular differentiation and proliferation an dthe degdree of expression of oncogene products.
It is
suggested that the activation of EGPR may play a role in onrmal and abnormal cellular prolar proliferation. Many reports have demonstrated that EGFR is overexpressed in genitourinary, breast, lung, head and neck tumors, and possibly used as tumor
marker. In this sutdy we measured EGFR mRNA by in situ hybridization in 64 patients with transitional cell carcinoma of bladder and 14 cases of normal bladder to evaluate its relation to the prognosis.
The positive staining of EGFDR mRNA by in situ hybridization was observed in 42.8% of normal urothelium and 100% of transitional cell carcinoma of bladder. The strong positive staining of EGFR mRNA was observed in 57.6% of superficial cancer of
bladder
and 80.6% of invasive one(Ta 25%, T1 62.1%, T2 76.9%, T4 100% and grade I 35%, Grade II 76.9%, Grade III 94.4%, respectively). As tumor stage and trade was increased, the corresponding strong positivity of EGFR mRNA was significant. Progression
to
invasive cancer occurred in 3 patients with superficial cancer and 2 of them had strong positive EGFR mRNA finding in original specimen. Tumor recurrences occurred in 15 patients with superficial cnacer and 8 of them had strong positive EGFR
mRNA
finding in original specimen. In 20 of the 25 patients(80%) who died of bladder cancer during the study tumors were EGFR mRNA strong positive. The death rate of patients with strong positive EGFR mRNA was significantly greater than that of
patient
with
weak positive EGFR mRNA tumor.
In conclusion, The kEGFDR mRNA expression of transitional cell carcinoma of bladder using in situ hybridiszation technique may be a useful tumor marker and prognosticd indicator.
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