PCNA Expression in Epithelial Ovarian Carcinomas

Objective: Immunohistochemical detection of PCNA shows active DNA replication and DNA damage resulting in carcinogenesis as well. PCNA has been used successfully as a marker of proliferation in hematologic malignancies, gastrointestinal malignancies, breast, skin, lung and urinary tract malignancies. In this study, it was aimed to determine the possibility of using PCNA, which shows proliferation in colorectal and bladder carcinomas, as tumor proliferation index in epithelial ovarian carcinomas.Method: Sixty patients, in the age of 17-82 diagnosed with epithelial ovarian carcinoma using routine pathologic materials after operations in streptoavidin-biotin medium, proliferating cell nuclear antigen immunoreactivity and PCNA indexes were evaluated with the primary antibodies.Results: The correlation between the epithelial ovarian carcinomas and PCNA immunoreactivity and indexes with the stage, grade and lymph node involvement was investigated. It was determined that the grade distributions of tumors were 26 % (n = 16) as grade 1, % 31 (n = 19) as grade 2 and 43% (n = 25) as grade 3. There was no statistically significant relationship between the histological tumor types and PCNA positivity (p> 0,05). PCNA indexes were found significantly higher in mucinous carcinomas than in serous carcinoma (p <0,001). As grade and stage of the tumors are getting higher, PCNA indexes are higher significantly too (p <0,001). Between the PCNA indexes and lymph node involvement no statistically significant relationship (p> 0,05) was determined. Conclusion: In epithelial ovarian carcinomas, it was determined that as stage and grade were increased, PCNA immunoreactivity and indexes were also increased. On the other hand, the relationship between PCNA and lymph node involvement were not observed. PCNA, as a tumor proliferation index of epithelial ovarian carcinoma have been showed significant results in this study, further studies are needed for clinical use.