1. ¹Department of Oral Surgery, Sapporo Medical University School of Medicine, South 1, West 16, Chuou-ku Sapporo 060-0061 Japan
2. ²Department of Clinical Pathology, Sapporo Medical University Hospital, South 1, West 16, Chuou-ku Sapporo 060-0061 Japan

Correspondence: Dr N Tanaka, E-mail: ntanaka@sapmed.ac.jp

Revised 24 March 2003; Accepted 7 May 2003.

Abstract

Regional lymph node metastasis is a very important prognostic indicator. In the metastatic process, reduction in cell to cell adhesion including E-cadherin–catenin cell adhesion complex is an essential step. We investigated immunohistochemical expression of E-cadherin, -catenin and -catenin in 159 tissue samples from patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma and examined the correlation between their expressions and the presence of regional lymph node metastasis. Significantly greater reduction in expression levels of E-cadherin, -catenin and -catenin was found in the metastatic group (n=64) compared to the nonmetastatic group (n=95) (P=0.007, 0.001, 0.001, respectively). However, there was no significant correlation between their expressions and the features of the regional metastasis, the number of metastatic lymph nodes or the presence of extracapsular metastasis. These data suggest that evaluation of the immunohistochemical expression of E-cadherin, -catenin and -catenin is extremely valuable for the diagnosis of metastatic occurrence.