Angiogenesis Of Endometrial Carcinomas Assessed By Measurment Of Intratumoral Blood Flow, Microvessel Density And Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor

Objective: To evaluate the correlation between intratumoral blood flow assessed by transvaginal color Doppler ultrasound, microvessel density and vascular endothelial growth factor levels in endometrial carcinoma and to explore the relationship between angiogenesis and clinicopathologic features in endometrial caicinoma.Methods: 42 patients undergoing surgery for endometrial carcinoma were enrolled. Transvaginal color Doppler flow imaging was performed preoperatively to detect the arterial blood flow signals within the tumors and the lowest resistance index (RI) value was recorded for analysis. The microvessel density, vascular endothelial growth factor levels of excised tumor were assessed immunohistochemically. The relationships between the corresponding RI, microvessel density and VEGF protein of the tumor tissues were analyzed. The relations between three indexes and clinicopathologic parameters of endometrial carcinoma were also analyzed.Results: Significantly lower RI values were noted in tumors of stage Ⅲ compared with stageⅠandⅡtumors, P＜0.05. There were no relations between RI and histological grade, myometrial invasion and pathologic type, P＞0.05. With the greater surgical stage, MVD increased. The MVD in stageⅠis significant lower than that in stageⅡand Ⅲ, P＜0.05. MVD were not associated with histologic grade, myometrial invasion and pathologic type, P＞0.05. The positive immunostaining rate of VEGF in 42 cases was 76.2% and it associated with surgical stage, The positive rate in stageⅠis significant lower than that in stageⅡand Ⅲ, P＜0.05. There were no relationsbetween the expression of VEGF and histologic grade,myometrial invasion, pathologic type, P＞0.05. MVD and RI in the tumor showed linear negative correlation, r=-0.287, P＜0.05. The mean MVD in VEGF-positive group was higher than that in VEGF-negative group, P＜0.05. RI in VEGF-positive group had no significant difference with that in VEGF-negative group, P＞0.05. Conclusions: The angiogenesis character of endometrial carcinoma can be showed by RI, MVD and VEGF from different angle and they had some inherent connections with clinicopathologic parameters of endometrial carcinoma, which indicating that we can supply some new theory for curing endometrial carcinoma and predicting prognosis of patients.