Immunomodulation of Vitamin D in Head and Neck Cancer

ProblemQuantitate the intratumoral differentiation of HNSCC induced immunoinhibitory CD34+ in response to enteral treatment of 1,25 dihydroxyvitamin D3 (1,25D3).Methods8 patients with HNSCC were treated orally with 3 weeks of 1,25D3 before surgical excision. Tumor tissue was collected and analyzed using immunohistochemistry to test the hypothesis that treatment would drive differentiation of immune inhibitory CD34+ cells into immune stimulatory dendritic cells. Patients’ clinical data for high risk pathological features were also analyzed.ResultsAfter 1,25D3 treatment, intratumoral levels of CD34+ cells significantly dropped. Levels of DC-lamp, a cellular marker for mature dendritic cells, significantly increased while there was not a change in intratumoral levels immature dendritic cell marker DC-sign. Levels of CD4+ cells were unchanged while levels of CD8+ cells were significantly decreased. There were no associated statistically significant correlations between CD34+ levels and histological features, ...