EXPRESSION OF TUMOUR ANTIGEN MAELSTROM IN OESOPHAGEAL CARCINOMA AND ITS CORRELATION WITH CLINICAL PROGNOSIS

Objective: To study the expression of Maelstrom (MAEL) in oesophageal carcinoma and its correlation with clinical prognosis. Methods: 68 specimens of oesophageal cancer tissues were collected in our hospital from February 2015 to August 2016, with normal oesophageal mucosa tissues collected as controls. Using the results of immunohistochemistry, the expression rate of the MAEL protein in oesophageal cancer tissues and adjacent tissues was measured and correlations between MAEL protein expression and gender, age, lymph node metastasis, tissue differentiation degree, and TNM stage were analysed. The relationship between MAEL protein expression and patient survival time was observed and recorded. Results: Immunohistochemistry showed that the positive expression rate of MAEL in oesophageal carcinoma was 78.38%, significantly higher than that in adjacent tissues (22.22%) (P>0.05). MAEL positive expression was associated with the degree of differentiation of oesophageal cancer tissues and the TNM stage. The positive expression rate of MAEL in well-differentiated carcinomas was 71.43%, which was significantly lower than that in moderate/low-differentiated carcinomas (80.85%) (P<0.05). The difference between TNM stages was statistically significant (P<0.05). MAEL positive expression was not associated with gender, age, or lymph node metastasis (P>0.05). Survival analysis was performed using the Kaplan-Meier estimator. The results showed that the 3-year survival rate of patients with MAEL-positive expression in oesophageal cancer tissues was 30% (15/53), which was significantly lower than that of patients with negative expression (65%, 9/15) (P<0.05). Through COX multivariate analysis, tissue differentiation, TNM stage, and MAEL expression were all identified as independent risk factors that affected the prognosis of oesophageal cancer patients. Conclusion: MAEL was highly expressed in oesophageal cancer tissues and was associated with tissue differentiation, TNM stage, and survival, and hence could be used as an indicator to evaluate the prognosis of patients with oesophageal cancer.