Histological response of cisplatin predicts patients' survival in oesophageal cancer and p53 protein accumulation in pretreatment biopsy is associated with cisplatin sensitivity.

The aim of this study was to evaluate whether cisplatin sensitivity relates to patient's prognosis in oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma and to find a useful chemosensitivity molecular marker. 59 oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) patients received cisplatin 30 mg/m2/week treatment of two to five cycles, followed by oesophagectomy. We analysed retrospectively whether the histological effect was related to patient's prognosis. Furthermore, to evaluate the relationship between the effect of preoperative cisplatin treatment and p53 and cyclin D1 expression, we investigated p53 and cyclin D1 expression in pretreatment biopsy samples using an immunohistochemical analysis and compared the results with the histological effect to cisplatin in the resected oesophagus. The cases that showed immunohistochemical p53 staining in the pretreatment biopsy samples were resistant to cisplatin (P = 0.032). However, there was no relationship between cyclin D1 expression and histological effect (P = 0.230). Nevertheless, combined analysis of p53 and cyclin D1 can predict histological effect (P = 0.032). The prognosis of cisplatin-sensitive cases was significantly better than that of cisplatin-resistant cases (P = 0.041). Cox's multivariate analysis revealed that the histological effect was an independent prognostic factor. In contrast, p53 protein accumulation and cyclin D1 were not. Histological response after neoadjuvant cisplatin treatment is a prognostic factor for oesophageal SCC and cisplatin chemotherapy may be selected according to the findings of p53 and cyclin D1 expression.

The Epstein-Barr virus is rarely associated with esophageal cancer.

The Epstein-Barr virus is an agent that causes African Burkitt's lymphoma, infectious mononucleosis, and Hodgkin's disease. It is also related to nasopharyngeal carcinoma and gastric carcinoma. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of the Epstein-Barr virus in esophageal cancer. Polymerase chain reaction and in situ hybridization were used to detect the Epstein-Barr virus. We detected 103 Epstein-Barr virus positive cells out of 107 of KYSE 273 cells using first standard-PCR. Epstein-Barr virus DNA could not be detected in 30 of the esophageal squamous cell carcinoma cell lines and 2 of the Barrett's esophageal adenocarcinoma cell lines. Out of 77 esophageal cancer patients, 3 cases were found positive for Epstein-Barr virus DNA using polymerase chain reaction. However, by in situ hybridization we found signals in only 1 of the 3 cases, the signal was located in the infiltrating lymphocytes. The Epstein-Barr virus is rarely associated with esophageal cancer.