Expression of bone morphogenic protein-4 is inversely related to prevalence of lymph node metastasis in gastric adenocarcinoma.

Purpose: Bone morphogenic proteins (BMPs) are the largest subfamily of the transforming growth factor-β superfamily. Initially characterized as factors that induce bone and cartilage formation, BMPs have been found to be critical during mesoderm formation, organogenesis, and cellular differentiation. Bone morphogenic proteins are also known to modulate the morphologic alteration, adhesion, motility, and invasion of carcinoma cells derived from several organs. However, BMP-4 expression in gastric adenocarcinoma has not yet been clarified. We conducted the present study to define the clinical significance of BMP-4 expression in gastric carcinoma.

Methods: Using immunohistochemistry, we investigated the expression of BMP-4 in normal mucosae and gastric adenocarcinoma samples from 64 patients with gastric carcinoma.

Results: The expression of BMP-4 was significantly higher in the adenocarcinoma than in the normal mucosae. Moreover, increased BMP-4 expression was associated with the presence of Helicobacter pylori infection. By contrast, the BMP-4 expression rate in gastric carcinoma was inversely related to the prevalence of lymph node metastasis and tumor invasiveness.

Conclusions: The findings of this study suggest that BMP-4 expression may be a useful prognostic factor for predicting the outcome of patients with gastric carcinoma. Continued investigation to define the pathophysiologic mechanism underlying the role of BMP-4 in gastric carcinoma is warranted.