Detection of ALK protein in lung squamous cell carcinoma with immunohistochemistry and FISH / 临床与实验病理学杂志

ABSTRACT

Purpose To investigate the occurrence of echinoderm microtubule-associated protein-like 4 (EML4) gene and the anaplas-tic lymphoma kinase (ALK) gene rearrangements in lung squamous cell carcinomas (SCC), and to provide with a test for targeted therapy of SCC. Methods In this study, we analyzed ALK protein expression with a specific rabbit monoclonal Ig antibody ( D5F3 clone) in 219 cases of lung SCC. The positive cases were confirmed with ALK fluorescence in situ hybridization ( FISH) . Results 4 out of 219 (1. 8%) cases of lung SCC were ALK positive detected by immunohistochemistry (IHC) staining, which were confirmed by ALK FISH. Conclusions There are SCC having EML4-ALK gene rearrangement. The response of SCC patients with ALK expression to targeted therapy of Crizotinib should be explored. Strong positive expression of ALK protein can be interpreted as EML4-ALK gene rearrangement.