Abstract

BACKGROUND:
Despite major advances in cancer treatment in the past two decades, the prognosis of patients with
lung cancer has improved only minimally. Although tumor stage is the most significant prognostic
factor, the variation in survival within staging groups requires information about additional factors
influencing the outcome. Among several genetic aberrations that have been implicated in lung
cancer, mutations in the p53 gene are the most common.
OBJECTIVE:
The aim of this study was to evaluate the expression of p53 in non-small cell lung cancer. To
correlate the relation of p53 with some clinico-pathological parameters. And to compare the results
with that of others.
PATIENTS AND METHODS:
Tumor tissues from 52 patients with non small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) were assessed by
immune-histochemistry for the expression of p53. The immunohistochemical study was performed
on formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded sections using LSAB immune-peroxidase method.
RESULTS:
Thirty nine (75%) of 52 patients revealed aberrant immunostaining for p53. No significant
relation was observed between the p53 and patient age (P=0.596). A significant association
(P=0.048) was found between the p53 and the sex of the patient with higher expression in males
and the p53 was significantly (P=0.0345) associated with histopathological type of tumor.
Comparing p53 expression with grade resulted in a strong positive correlation (P= 0.0002). The
percentage of p53-positive tumors progressively increased from (2.56%) in well differentiation to
(53.85%) in poorly differentiated tumor.
CONCLUSION:
P53 was significantly association with sex, grade and histological type, the detection of p53 may be
important marker to predict the prognosis of the patients with NSCLC and for stratifying these
patients into more accurate prognostic group