The prognostic significance of E-cadherin and liver intestine-cadherin expression in colorectal cancer.

Purpose: The significance of liver intestine-cadherin as a potential marker has been growing in the field of oncology, because of its unique features compared with classic cadherins. We investigated the coexpression patterns of E-cadherin and liver intestine-cadherin in colorectal cancer, and determined whether differences in expression patterns were associated with clinicopathologic parameters and also which relationship between these two adhesion molecules existed in colorectal cancer.

Methods: Expression pattern of E-cadherin and liver intestine-cadherin was investigated immunohistochemically in 207 colorectal cancers along with clinicopathologic parameters.

Results: Reduced expression of liver intestine-cadherin was detected in 51 percent (n = 105) of tumors. Such expression was found to be associated with tumoral dedifferentiation (P = 0.015) and in a multivariate analysis was associated with a significant worse overall survival after adjustment for tumor stage, differentiation, and E-cadherin status (hazard ratio, 1.951; 95 percent confidence interval, 1.06-3.592; P = 0.032). Fifteen percent (n = 32) of tumors showed reduced expression of E-cadherin and had relationship with tumoral dedifferentiation (P < 0.001), lymph node metastasis (P = 0.004), and advanced stage (P = 0.029). Reduced expression of E-cadherin was associated with short overall survival (P = 0.028); however, in a multivariate analysis, it was not statistically significant.

Conclusions: Reduced expression of liver intestine-cadherin had a significant correlation with tumoral dedifferentiation and short overall survival in this series. In addition, early and frequent loss of liver intestine-cadherin expression might be a more sensitive indicator than E-cadherin to predict more aggressive tumoral behavior.