Expressions of angiogenic factors in pancreatic ductal carcinoma: A correlative study with clinicopathologic parameters and patient survival

Introduction: It has been reported that angiogenic factors play an important role in proliferation and metastasis in various cancers. Aim: To investigate the expression of angiogenic factors and microvessel density (MVD) in pancreatic ductal carcinoma and to examine the correlations among expression of angiogenic factors, clinicopathologic parameters, and clinical prognosis. Methodology: Paraffin-embedded specimens from 55 patients with pancreatic ductal carcinoma were immunostained for vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2), platelet-derived endothelial cell growth factor (PD-ECGF), and CD34. The correlations among the expression of individual angiogenic factors and MVD, the clinicopathologic features, and the clinical prognoses were analyzed statistically. Results: Immunostaining demonstrated that 70.8% of pancreatic ductal carcinomas were positive for VEGF, 60.9% for FGF-2, and 57.2% for PD-ECGF. A significant correlation was observed between VEGF expression and MVD (p < 0.05) but not between FGF-2 or PD-ECGF and MVD. Although the expression of each angiogenic factor had no correlation with clinicopathologic features, the patients with tumors that showed high expression of VEGF and FGF-2 had significantly shorter survival times than those with low or no such expression (p < 0.05). Conclusions: These observations suggest that the expression of VEGF closely correlates with MVD and with a poor prognosis in pancreatic ductal carcinoma.