Abstract

Dysadherin expressions are associated with the aggressive tumors that show poor prognosis in different types of cancers. Aggressive tumors often presented with infiltrative type of growth pattern in colon cancer and that has been associated with poor prognosis as well. The aim of this was to evaluate Dysadherin expression in paired normal and tumor samples, and tumor growth pattern in the form of complexity index in the same patient colon cancer samples, and finally to correlate with each other and different clinical and pathological parameters. To evaluate Dysadherin expression, we selected 45 patients and performed RT-qPCR on normal and paired tumor samples. To determine growth pattern, we captured pictures from the immunohistochemically stained tumor invasive fronts and then evaluated by using Photoshop CS, Fovea Pro, and Image J computer programs. Paired t test was applied for the Dysadherin expression between normal and paired normal samples while Pearson chi square and Fischer exact test between dichotomized Dysadherin expression, complexity index and different clinicopathological parameters. Mean Dysadherin expression in normal samples was 0.155+0.0167 and in tumor 0.869+0.083 and was significantly different between two groups of samples (P value<0.0001). In dichotomized groups, increased Dysadherin expression was significantly correlated with the lymph node metastasis and advanced Dukes stages. Higher complexity index was significantly associated with low differentiated tumors while non-significantly with other clinicopathological parameters. In conclusion, Dysadherin expression and tumor growth pattern are independent features, where Dysadherin expression is associated with advanced Dukes staged tumors and complexity index with the poorly differentiated tumors.

Keywords: Complexity index; Dysadherin; Clinicopathological parameters; Tumor node metastasis