Loss of stromal caveolin-1 expression in colorectal cancer predicts poor survival.

Aim: To investigate the clinicopathological significance and prognostic value of caveolin-1 (CAV-1) in both tumor and stromal cells in colorectal cancer (CRC).

Methods: A total of 178 patients with CRC were included in this study. The correlation between CAV-1 expression and clinicopathologic features and survival was studied.

Results: CAV-1 expression was detected in tumor and stromal cells. The expression of stromal CAV-1 was closely associated with histological type (P=0.022), pathologic tumor-node-metastasis stage (P=0.047), pathologic N stage (P=0.035) and recurrence (P=0.000). However, tumor cell CAV-1 did not show any correlation with clinical parameters. Additionally, the loss of stromal CAV-1 expression was associated with shorter disease-free survival (P=0.000) and overall survival (P=0.000). Multivariate analysis revealed that the loss of stromal CAV-1 expression was an independent prognostic factor for both overall survival (P=0.014) and disease-free survival (P=0.006).

Conclusion: The loss of stromal CAV-1 expression in CRC was associated with poor prognosis and could be a prognostic factor for CRC patients.