A new blood supply for human primary gallbladder carcinomas:vasculogenic mimicry,and its correlation with VEGF and significance

Objective To explore if vasculogenic mimicry (VM) exists in human primary gallbladder carcinomas and evaluate the correlation between the VM and expression of vascular epithelial growth factor (VEGF) in gallbladder carcinomas and its significance. MethodsSeventy-four carcinomas, 10 adenomas and 10 chronic inflammatory lesions of the gallbladder underwent operation and confirmed histopathologically were studied. Clinical-pathological data and survival of each patient with gallbladder carcinoma were recorded and followed-up. VM in human gallbladder carcinomas was observed under light microscope by HE staining, CD31 and PAS staining; the expression of VEGF proteins in each paraffin section of each patient in vivo was determined by Envision method of immunohistochemistry; the correlation among the VM, VEGF expression and their clinical significance in the patients with gallbladder carcinomas were analyzed and compared by Kaplan-Meier actuarial survival curves and Cox multiple factors. Results①13.5% (10/74) of human gallbladder carcinomas were found to contain VM, namely intratumoral, tumor cell-lined extracellular matrix (ECM)-rich, PAS-positive and vasculogenic-like network patterns. VM was associated with histological type (χ2=10.241,P=0.017), hepatic metastasis (χ2=4.238,P=0.042) and poor overall survival (χ2=5.722 1,P=0.016). ②Expression of VEGF was increased significantly in carcinomas with or without VM than adenomas and inflammatory lesions of the gallbladder (P<0.000 1) in vivo; VEGF expression in the gallbladder carcinomas without VM was increased significantly than that with VM (P=0.018 2). ③There is positive correlation between expression of VEGF and the gallbladder carcinomas without VM in the cases of Nevin stage (P=0.003 5), invasion depth (P=0.005 9), liver metastases (P=0.037 3) and lymph node metastases (P=0.000 1), the same correlation was only observed between expression of VEGF and the gallbladder carcinomas with VM in the cases of liver metastases (P=0.032 3). When being compared the