The expression and prognosis of FOXO3a and Skp2 in human ovarian cancer

The forkhead box proteins (FOXO proteins) comprise a large family of functionally diverse transcription factors involved in cellular proliferation, transformation, differentiation and longevity. Recently, ubiquitination and proteasome degradation of FOXO3a have been reported. In this study, we investigated the role of FOXO3a and Skp2 in human ovarian cancer. We detected the expression of FOXO3a and Skp2 in ovarian cancer by immunohistochemistry (IHC) and analyzed the relationship of FOXO3a and Skp2 with clinicopathological parameters, including prognosis. Immunohistochemical analysis was performed on formalin-fixed paraffin sections of 46 specimens in vivo. We found that the expression of FOXO3a was negatively related to Skp2 expression (r = -0.743; p < 0.05) and FOXO3a expression correlates significantly with disease stage (p = 0.007) and lymph node (p = 0.009) while Skp2 expression correlates significantly with age (p = 0.040), disease stage (p = 0.003) and lymph node (p = 0.019). Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed that survival curves of low versus high expressers of FOXO3a and Skp2 showed a highly significant separation in ovarian cancer (p < 0.01). FOXO3a and Skp2 may be considered to be important prognoses in human ovarian cancer.