Altered expression of a Li-cadherin in gastric cancer and intestinal metaplasia

The aims of this study were to examine Li-cadherin expression in 74 gastric carcinoma tissues, 10 cases with normal gastric tissues, and 21 cases with intestinal metaplasia and to investigate the role of Li-cadherin in cell differentiation, cancer invasion, and metastasis. Expression of Li-cadherin was analyzed by immunohistochemistry and semiquantitative polymerase chain reactio and correlated with clinicopathological parameters. Immunohistochemistry showed that Li-cadherin was mainly present on the cell membrane and there was no staining for liver-intestine cadherin in normal tissues. The reduction of Li-cadherin mRNA expression was inversely correlated with the grade of differentiation (P < 0.05). Significant differences in the expression of liver-intestine cadherin were found in lymphatic metastasis of the tumors (P < 0.05), but the expression of liver-intestine cadherin was not associated with gender (P=0.748), serosal invasion (P=0.136), TNM stage (P=0.172), Helicobacter pylori infection (P=0.572), liver metastasis (P=0.374), or peritoneal metastasis (P=0.621). Multivariate analysis revealed that the expression of Li-cadherin is an important predictor of lymph node metastasis. We conclude that there is a significant correlation between Li-cadherin expression and the differentiation of gastric carcinoma, and Li-cadherin can be a good marker to detect gastric cancer at early stages. Increased Li-cadherin expression may contribute to gastric cancer invasion to lymph nodes.