Value Assessment of Airport Billboards Based on Passenger Big Data.

As an important element of the airport ecosystem, airport billboards are playing a crucial role in publicizing the city image and facilitating humanistic airport construction. At the same time, airport billboards have great commercial value and is a popular channel for enterprises to prompt their products and to build their brand image. Currently, most airports in China adopt a simple fixed pricing mechanism for airport billboards. Specifically, for any type of billboard, the advertising price is mainly determined by considering historical prices and the total passenger flow of the entire airport during a whole year. However, this seemingly crude pricing mechanism only considers macro-level data of passenger flow and fails in reflecting the real value of billboards in different locations effectively, since the value of a particular billboard depends not only on its media form, but also on the number of passengers flowing through and whether these passengers are the target customers of the advertising content. Based on big data on airport layout, flight information, and passenger attributes, this paper proposes a time- and location-based value assessment model for airport billboards. Using sample data collected from the Beijing Capital International Airport, the assessment model is adopted to evaluate the value of two real billboards in Terminal T3. Application of this model can reflect the difference in the value of airport billboards located in different spots during various periods. Furthermore, this model provides a solid foundation for airport executives to develop differentiated/dynamic pricing and flexible advertisement scheduling strategies, thereby improving the overall efficiency.

Grocott Methenamine Silver Staining Is the Optimal Approach to Histological Diagnosis of Pulmonary Cryptococcosis.

Background: Histological staining methods for Cryptococcus identification vary in accuracy. This study aimed to investigate the clinical value of Grocott methenamine silver (GMS), periodic acid-Schiff (PAS), and Alcian blue (AB) staining in the diagnosis of pulmonary cryptococcosis (PC). Methods: From April 2004 to June 2021, the clinical and pathological data of 152 patients with PC were collected from the Department of Pathology, Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center. The sensitivity and identifiability of GMS, PAS, and AB staining for histological diagnosis were systematically evaluated using statistical methods combined with the microscopic characteristics of PC cases. Results: Statistical analysis showed that the detection rates of GMS, PAS, and AB staining were 100.0% (152/152), 94.7% (144/152), and 81.6% (124/152), respectively. McNemar's test showed that the sensitivity of GMS was significantly higher than those of PAS (P = 0.008) and AB stains (P < 0.001). Both PAS and AB stains had obvious non-specific staining, which interfered with the detection of Cryptococcus, and increased diagnostic difficulties. In contrast, in GMS staining, Cryptococcus spores were prominent with a clean background and were clearly observed at low or medium power magnification, with the identifiability significantly better than those of PAS or AB staining. Conclusion: GMS staining had sensitivity up to 100%, and identifiability that was better than those of PAS and AB staining. GMS is the best method for histological diagnosis of PC.

ZMYND8 expression combined with pN and pM classification as a novel prognostic prediction model for colorectal cancer: Based on TCGA and GEO database analysis.

BACKGROUND: Zinc finger MYND (Myeloid, Nervy and DEAF-1)-type containing 8 (ZMYND8) is closely correlated with tumor proliferation and invasiveness. However, its prognostic value has not been estimated in colorectal cancer (CRC). OBJECTIVE: We aimed to elucidate the prognostic significance of ZMYND8 expression and the pN and pM classification supplemented by its expression in CRCs. METHODS: The candidate gene ZMYND8 is identified by TCGA database and GEO database, and then we retrospectively evaluated the status and prognostic significance of ZMYND8 expression of 174 patients with CRC. RESULTS: Online data showed high expression of ZMYND8 is closely correlated with worse overall survival. Our study revealed high expression of ZMYND8 in CRC patients was significantly associated with worse overall and disease-free survival (P< 0.05), and was an independently adverse prognostic factor for overall survival (P< 0.001) and disease-free survival (P= 0.001) by univariate and multivariate analysis. C-index to combined prognostic model containing the pN, pM classification supplemented by the status of ZMYND8 expression showed improved predictive ability comparing with the pN and pM classification model (C-index of 0.597 vs. 0.545, respectively). CONCLUSION: The combined prognostic model could improve the ability to determine the clinical outcome of patients with CRC.

C-C motif chemokine 14 as a novel potential biomarker for predicting the prognosis of epithelial ovarian cancer.

Previous studies have demonstrated that C-C motif chemokine 14 (CCL14) plays an important role in the occurrence and development of cancer. However, the significance of CCL14 in the progression and prognosis of epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) has not yet been reported. The standard EnVision procedure for tissue microarrays was used to evaluate the immunohistochemical expression of CCL14 protein in 154 patients with EOC who underwent tumor-debulking operations at the Central Cancer Department of Sun Yat-Sen University (Guangzhou, China) or Jiangmen Central Hospital (Jiangmen, China). The association between CCL14 expression and clinicopathological variables was assessed using the χ2 test. For survival status of patients with EOC, Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and a Cox multivariate regression model was used. Expression of CCL14 protein was significantly associated with International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetric stage (P=0.014) and pN status(P=0.005). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis revealed that the survival time of patients with high expression of CCL14 was 136.1 months and that of patients with low expression of CCL14 was 98.9 months (P=0.026). Multivariate analysis demonstrated that CCL14 upregulation was associated with overall survival time (HR, 0.48; 95% CI, 0.261-0.896; P=0.021) and progression-free survival time (HR,0.437; 95% CI, 0.228-0.839; P=0.013). In conclusion, CCL14 is an independent prognostic factor for EOC and upregulation of CCL14 is associated with a more favorable prognosis in patients with EOC.

Extracting causal relations from the literature with word vector mapping.

Causal graphs play an essential role in the determination of causalities and have been applied in many domains including biology and medicine. Traditional causal graph construction methods are usually data-driven and may not deliver the desired accuracy of a graph. Considering the vast number of publications with causality knowledge, extracting causal relations from the literature to help to establish causal graphs becomes possible. Current supervised-learning-based causality extraction methods requires sufficient labeled data to train a model, and rule-based causality extraction methods are limited by the predefined patterns. This paper proposes a causality extraction framework by integrating rule-based methods and unsupervised learning models to overcome these limitations. The proposed method consists of three modules, including data preprocessing, syntactic pattern matching, and causality determination. In data preprocessing, abstracts are crawled based on attribute names before sentences are extracted and simplified. In syntactic pattern matching, these simplified sentences are parsed to obtain the part-of-speech tags, and triples are achieved based on these tags by matching the two designed syntactic patterns. In causality determination, four verb seed sets are initialized, and word vectors are constructed for the verbs in both the seed sets and the triples by applying an unsupervised machine learning model. Causal relations are identified by comparing the similarity between the verbs in each triple and that in each seed set to overcome the limitation of the seed sets. Causality extraction results on the attributes from the risk factors for Alzheimer's disease show that our method outperforms Bui's method and Alashri's method in terms of precision, recall, specificity, accuracy and F-score, with increases in the F-score of 8.29% and 5.37%, respectively.

A Systematic Review and Bayesian Network Meta-Analysis: Short-Term and Long-Term Outcomes of Three Surgery Procedures Following Neoadjuvant Chemoradiotherapy for Rectal Cancer.

Aim: Our aim was to perform a Bayesian network meta-analysis of short-term and long-term outcomes of open surgery (OS), laparoscopic surgery (LS), and robotic surgery (RS) after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (nCRT) for rectal cancer. Methods: We searched randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and non-RCTs published up to October 2018 from PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science. We selected studies referencing the comparison between at least two of OS, LS, and RS. Short-term and long-term outcomes of different surgery procedures were evaluated. Mean differences or odds ratios and their 95% credible interval were pooled with Bayesian modeling. Results: In the network meta-analysis, 15 studies were identified through database searching and other sources that included three RCTs and nine non-RCTs enrolling 2360 patients. As for long-term outcomes, we did not find any significant difference among these surgery procedures after nCRT for rectal cancer in this network meta-analysis. As for short-term outcomes, no significant outcomes were obtained except for operative time, blood loss, length of incision, and time to pass first flatus. Our meta-analysis illustrated that RS had the longest operative time. However, LS had a significantly shorter operative time than RS, shorter incision than OS, shorter time to pass first flatus than OS, and less blood loss than OS. Conclusions: RS was regarded as the inferior surgery procedure after nCRT for rectal cancer. Meanwhile, LS might possibly be the most safe and feasible surgery procedure after nCRT for rectal cancer.

Prognostic significance of preoperative peripheral blood neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR) in lung sarcomatoid carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: The present study aimed to evaluate the prognostic value of the neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR) in patients with lung sarcomatoid carcinoma (LSC). METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed the clinicopathological parameters of 100 cases of LSC in the Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center. Receiver operator characteristics curve analysis was performed to define the cutoff point for the preoperative peripheral blood NLR. The relationship between NLR and the clinicopathological parameters of patients with LSC was estimated using χ2 analysis. Univariate and multivariate statistical analyses were carried out to evaluate the impact of preoperative blood NLR on postoperative survival of patients with LSC. RESULTS: The analyses revealed that the preoperative peripheral blood NLR was significantly associated with tumor size, pN stage, and clinical stage (P<0.05). No relationship was found between NLR and age, gender, smoking, pT stage, pM stage, relapse, and therapy. Preoperative peripheral blood NLR, clinical stage, pT stage, tumor-node-metastasis stage, and tumor size were associated with prognosis in the Kaplan-Meier survival analysis. Patients with a low NLR value had longer survival time than those with a high NLR [mean overall survival (OS) time: 87.1 vs. 16.0 months, P<0.05]. Cox multivariate analysis confirmed that preoperative peripheral blood NLR was an independent indicator for the prognosis of LSC (hazard ratio =3.906, P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The preoperative peripheral blood NLR was associated closely with the development and progression of LSC. Patients with an increased NLR were likely to have poor prognosis. Preoperative peripheral blood NLR might function as an important independent prognostic indicator for patients with LSC.

CD8+ tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes as a novel prognostic biomarker in lung sarcomatoid carcinoma, a rare subtype of lung cancer.

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to investigate the degree of infiltration of CD8+ tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) including high and low density in lung sarcomatoid carcinoma (LSC) and their clinicopathological significance. PATIENTS AND METHODS: The density of CD8+ TILs in paraffin-embedded tissue sections from 100 LSC patients was detected by immunohistochemical staining, and the relationship of CD8+ TILs with clinicopathological features and prognosis was analyzed. RESULTS: The chi-squared test showed that the degree of infiltration of CD8+ TILs was significantly correlated with the clinicopathological stage and T stage of LSC (P<0.05). The univariate analysis demonstrated that tumor size, clinicopathological stage, T stage, N stage, M stage, and CD8+ TILs are risk factors that affect prognosis of the patients (P<0.05). The mean overall survival (OS) of LSC patients with a high density of CD8+ TILs was 92.3 months, which was significantly higher than 31.2 months in patients with a low density of CD8+ TILs (P<0.05). Cox regression multivariate analysis confirmed that the density of CD8+ TILs was an independent prognostic factor for OS time of LSC patients (hazard ratio=0.455, P<0.05). CONCLUSION: CD8+ TILs could be used as an effective prognostic index for LSC patients, and a high density of CD8+ TILs in tumor tissue may predict a better outcome.

Decreased expression of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor alpha indicates unfavorable outcomes in hepatocellular carcinoma.

INTRODUCTION: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has a close relationship with lipid metabolism. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor α (PPARα) plays a crucial role in the regulation of fatty acid oxidation in the liver. However, the role of PPARα in HCC remains unclear. METHODS: A total of 804 HCC specimens were collected to construct a tissue microarray and for immunohistochemical analysis. The relationship between PPARα expression and clinical features of HCC patients was analyzed. Kaplan-Meier analysis was conducted to assess the prognostic value of PPARα expression levels. RESULTS: The expression of PPARα in HCC was noticeably decreased in HCC tissues. HCC patients with high levels of PPARα expression in cytoplasm had smaller tumors (P=0.027), less vascular invasion (P=0.049), and a higher proportion of complete involucrum (P=0.038). Kaplan-Meier analysis showed that HCC patients with low PPARα expression in the cytoplasm had significantly worse outcomes in terms of overall survival (P<0.001), disease-free survival (P=0.024), and the probability of recurrence (P=0.037). Similarly, overall survival was significantly shorter in HCC patients with negative PPARα expression in the nucleus (P=0.034). Multivariate Cox analyses indicated that tumor size (P=0.001), TNM stage (P<0.001), vascular invasion (P<0.001), and PPARα expression in the cytoplasm (P<0.001) were found to be independent prognostic variables for overall survival. CONCLUSION: Our data revealed that PPARα expression was decreased in HCC samples. High PPARα expression was correlated with longer survival times in HCC patients, and served as an independent factor for better outcomes. Our study therefore provides a promising biomarker for prognostic prediction and a potential therapeutic target for HCC.

Overexpression of LBH is associated with poor prognosis in human hepatocellular carcinoma.

PURPOSE: Limb-bud and heart (LBH) levels are correlated with adverse survival in several malignancies; however, their significance in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains unclear. The objective of this study was to determine the association between LBH status and clinical outcomes. METHODS: We selected 226 patients with HCC who were treated surgically between 2003 and 2010 at a single academic center. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) was used to detect the protein expression of LBH in HCC samples. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis, Spearman's rank correlation, Kaplan-Meier plots, and the Cox proportional hazards regression model were used to analyze the data. RESULTS: A high expression of LBH was detected in 20 (8.8%) of 226 HCC samples. Correlation analysis demonstrated that LBH in HCC was significantly correlated with aspartate aminotransferase (AST)/alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels and clinical stages (P<0.05). In the Kaplan-Meier analysis, the mean survival time of patients with low levels of LBH was longer than that for those with high levels of LBH (P<0.05). The 3-year overall survival rate was 20% for patients with HCC and high levels of LBH versus 67% for patients with HCC and low levels of LBH. In the multivariate analysis, AST/ALT level, clinical stage, tumor relapse, and the level of LBH were the independent prognostic factors for overall survival (P<0.05). CONCLUSION: Overexpression of LBH might contribute to the development and progression of HCC. LBH could be a novel prognostic marker for HCC.

p53R2 as a novel prognostic biomarker in nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: p53R2 is a target of p53 gene, which is essential for DNA repair, mitochondrial DNA synthesis, protection against oxidative stress, chromosomal instability, chronic inflammation and tumorigenesis. This study is aimed to investigate the expression of ribonucleotide reductase (RR) subunit p53R2 in nasopharyngeal carcinoma and its significance in the prognosis. METHODS: The expression levels of p53R2 in 201 patients with NPC were examined by immunohistochemical assay. The correlations of p53R2 expression and clinicopathological features of nasopharyngeal carcinoma patient were analysed by chi-square test. The Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and Cox multivariate regression model were used to analyze the prognostic significance of the patients with NPC. RESULTS: Immunohistochemical results showed that p53R2 was positively expressed in 92.5% (186/201) of nasopharyngeal carcinoma and the high expression rate was 38.3% (77/201). Further analysis observed that the negative correlation between expression of p53R2 and pT status had statistical significance (P < 0.05). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis found that the mean survival time of patients with high expression of p53R2 was 143.32 months, while the patients with low expression level of p53R2 was 121.63 months (P < 0.05). Cox regression analysis suggested that p53R2 protein expression could be used as an independent prognostic factor for nasopharyngeal carcinoma (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: This study drew a conclusion that p53R2 could be used as a prognostic biomarker indicative of the favorable outcome for patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

Overexpression of p53R2 is associated with poor prognosis in lung sarcomatoid carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: This study aimmed to evaluate the expression of p53-inducible RR small subunit 2 homologue (p53R2) in Lung sarcomatoid carcinoma (LSC) and its association with clinicopathological parameters and prognosis. METHODS: In this study, clinicopathological factors and prognostic significance of the expression of p53R2 was investigated by immunohistochemistry (IHC) in 100 cases of LSC. RESULTS: The results showed that the expression of p53R2 was significantly correlated with clinical stage (P<0.05). But there was no statistically correlation with gender, age, smoking, tumor size, pT stage, pN stage, pM stage, therapy and relapse. Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed that the expression of p53R2, clinical stage, pT stage, pN stage, pM stage and tumor size were closely related to patients' survival, and the analysis also revealed that patients with low expression of p53R2 had a longer overall survival than that with high expression (Mean overall survival: 84.8 months vs. 34.7 months, P<0.05). Further multivariate analysis indicated that the expression of p53R2 was identified as an independent prognostic factor in the prediction of the overall survival for patients with LSC (HR = 3.217, P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The expression of p53R2 was inversely associated with the proliferation and progression of LSC, and the results indicated that the high expression of p53R2 was an independent factor for unfavorable prognosis of patients with LSC.

Overexpression of α-sma-positive fibroblasts (CAFs) in Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Predicts Poor Prognosis.

Purpose: The aim of this study is to investigate the differential expression of α-sma-positive fibroblasts (CAFs) in nasopharyngeal carcinomas (NPCs), nasopharyngitis, metastatic tissues of NPCs and its prognostic value in NPCs. Methods: The expression of α-sma-labeled CAFs in 85 NPCs, 32 nasopharyngitis and 12 metastatic tissues of NPCs was detected by immunohistochemical method. The relationship between CAFs and clinicopathological parameters of NPCs was analyzed. Results: The high density of CAFs in the NPCs, nasopharyngitis and metastatic tissues of NPCs group were 41.2% (35/85), 6.2% (2/32) and 83.3% (10/12), and a significant difference was showed among these three groups (P<0.05). Chi-square test showed that there was no significant correlation between the density of CAFs and gender, age, N stage, treatment (P>0.05), but closely correlated with T stage and relapse (P<0.05). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis showed that the mean overall survival of high-density and low-density CAFs was 86.8 months and 127.0 months, respectively. Correspondingly, the 5-year survival rates were 57.1% (20/35) and 90.0% (45/50), and there were inversely statistical differences between two groups (P<0.05). Cox multivariate analysis showed that the density of CAFs could be used as an independent prognostic factor for the survival of NPC patients (P<0.05). Conclusions: The density of CAFs could be closely related to the metastasis of NPCs, and also is an efficient prediction factor of poor survival in patients with NPCs.

Primary localized amyloidoma of the renal pelvis: A case report and literature review.

Primary localized amyloidomas of the renal pelvis are challenging to diagnose, due to non-specific imaging results and the unusual location. The present study reports a rare case of primary localized amyloidoma of the renal pelvis and aims to illustrate the challenges in pre-operatively discriminating between this disease and transitional cell carcinomas. The present study identified that the mass was situated in the left renal pelvis using ultrasonography. A nephroureterectomy was performed following careful preparation. Finally, histopathological studies revealed that the tumor consisted of massive diffuse deposits of amyloid and microscopic amorphous eosinophilic material, which stained positively for Congo red, demonstrating potassium permanganate digestion. Consequently, a diagnosis of amyloid light chain-type amyloidoma was determined. Systematic examinations were performed following the unexpected diagnosis, which eliminated the possibility of amyloid associated-type amyloidoma. In total, 4 months post-surgery, the patient remained tumor-free.

Prognostic factors of primary pulmonary mucoepidermoid carcinoma: a clinical and pathological analysis of 34 cases.

Pulmonary mucoepidermoid carcinoma (PMEC) is a rare malignant neoplasm, and little is known about the prognostic factors. The aim of the present study was to identify the relationship between tumor's histological features and clinical behaviors and to analyze the survival of patients with PMEC. A total of 34 patients with PMEC from May 2001 to April 2013 were included in the investigation. The clinical data, radiological manifestation, pathological findings, treatment strategy, and prognoses of all patients were analyzed retrospectively. The patients were classified into low-grade group (n = 25) and high-grade group (n = 9), based on histological grades. High-grade PMEC was more common in patient with elevated serum carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) (P = 0.033), advanced tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage (P = 0.004) and lymph node metastasis (P < 0.001). The 5-year PFS and OS of all patients were 75.7% and 83.6%, respectively. Age, pathological grade, lymph node metastasis and TNM stage were correlated with the survival of PMEC patients. Lymph node metastasis was an independent predictor of OS (HR, 0.080; P = 0.029) and PFS (HR, 0.090; P = 0. 004). A higher tumor histological grade indicated a more aggressive behavior. Patients who had undergone complete resection for PMEC without any lymph node metastasis were expected to be cured.

Increased intratumoral neutrophil in colorectal carcinomas correlates closely with malignant phenotype and predicts patients' adverse prognosis.

BACKGROUND: Substantial evidence suggests that the presence of inflammatory cells plays a critical role in the development and/or progression of human tumors. Neutrophils are the common inflammatory cells in tumors; however, the infiltration of intratumoral neutrophils in colorectal carcinoma (CRC) and its effect on CRC patients' prognosis are poorly understood. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: In this study, the methods of tissue microarray and immunohistochemistry (IHC) were used to investigate the prognostic significance of intratumoral CD66b+ neutrophil in CRC. According to receiver operating characteristic curve analysis, the cutoff score for high intratumoral CD66b+ neutrophil in CRC was defined when the mean counts were more than 60 per TMA spot. In our study, high intratumoral CD66b+ neutrophil was observed in 104/229 (45.4%) of CRCs and in 29/229 (12.7%) of adjacent mucosal tissues. Further correlation analysis showed that high intratumoral neutrophil was positively correlated with pT status, pM status and clinical stage (P<0.05). In univariate survival analysis, a significant association between high intratumoral neutrophil and shortened patients' survival was found (P<0.0001). In different subsets of CRC patients, intratumoral neutrophil was also a prognostic indicator in patients with stage II, stage III, grade 2, grade 3, pT1, pT2, pN0 and pN1 (P<0.05). Importantly, high intratumoral neutrophil was evaluated as an independent prognostic factor in multivariate analysis (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Our results provide evidence that increased intratumoral neutrophil in CRC may be important in the acquisition of a malignant phenotype, indicating that the presence of intratumoral neutrophil is an independent factor for poor prognosis of patients with CRC.

Overexpression of SGLT1 is correlated with tumor development and poor prognosis of ovarian carcinoma.

PURPOSE: Overexpression of glucose transporters has been identified in a variety of human cancers. However, the expression status of Sodium dependent Glucose Transporter 1 (SGLT1) in ovarian carcinoma has not been investigated. METHODS: In our study, protein expression levels of SGLT1 were explored by semiquantitative immunohistochemical staining on archival formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded pathologic specimen consisting of 178 epithelial ovarian tumors. Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis, Spearman's rank correlation, Kaplan-Meier plots and Cox proportional hazards regression model were utilized to analyze the data. RESULTS: The threshold for high expression of SGLT1 was determined to be above 40% (areas under curve = 0.683, P = 0.003) based on the area under curves. Significantly overexpression of SGLT1 was observed in 39.7% invasive carcinomas, 11.5% borderline tumors, 10% cystadenomas but in none of the normal ovaries (0%). In ovarian carcinomas, SGLT1 overexpression was positively correlated with later pT status (P = 0.029) and advanced FIGO stage (P = 0.024). By univariate survival analysis on the ovarian carcinoma cohorts, overexpression of SGLT1 was associated with shortened patient survival (mean 70.5 months in tumors with overexpression of SGLT1 versus 89.3 months in tumors with normal levels of SGLT1; P = 0.019). By multivariate analysis, SGLT1 protein expression remained as a significant and independent prognostic factor for the prediction of patient survival (P = 0.033). CONCLUSIONS: SGLT1 overexpression, as examined by immunohistochemistry, is an independent biomarker for poor prognosis of patients with ovarian carcinoma.

[Study of CD44v6 protein expression in intraductal papilloma and its malignant transformation of breast].

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE: CD44v6 plays an important role in the malignant transformation of breast epithelia and is differentially expressed in normal and neoplastic breast tissue. The diagnostic value of this marker in differentiating malignant from benign breast lesions has not been well examined. This study was designed to evaluate the diagnostic value of CD44v6 protein in distinguishing between benign and malignant papillary lesions of the breast, which is be difficult morphologically, by determining the level of CD44v6 expression in different lesions of the breast. METHODS: The level of CD44v6 protein was detected by immunohistochemistry in 111 paraffin-embeded blocks. RESULT: The positive expressive rates of CD44v6 protein in the basal epithelial cells of the normal tissue, intraductal papilloma, and its malignant transformation, intraductal carcinoma, invasive ductal carcinoma were 95.00%, 85.72%, 66.66%, 66.66%, and 0.00% respectively. The difference between the intraductal papilloma and its malignant transformation was not significant(P > 0.05). However, the positive expressive rates of CD44v6 protein in the luminal epithelial cells of the above lesions were 5.00%, 20.41%, 83.34%, 93.33%, and 100% respectively. There was difference between intraductal papilloma and its malignant transformation(P < 0.01). CONCLUSION: CD44v6 detection by immunohistochemistry is useful in distinguishing intraductal papilloma from its malignant transformation of the breast.