THE CORRELATION BETWEEN SERUM ANTI-p53 ANTIBODIES AND THE OVEREXPRESSION OF TUMOUR p53 PROTEIN IN PATIENTS WITH BLADDER TUMOR AND ITS CLINICAL IMPORTANCE

Abstract

Abstract In this study, we aimed to assess the correlation between serum anti-p53 antibodies and the overexpression of tumor p53 protein in patients with bladder tumor as well as its relationship with the clinical and pathologic findings. Sixty-eight patients with transitional cell carcinoma of the urinary bladder (17Ta, 28 T1, 23 T2) were prospectively assessed. Serum anti-p53 antibodies were detected by ELISA using microtitre plates, covered by recombinant wild-type human p53 protein and control protein (Pharmacell, France). The expression of tumour p53 protein was assessed by immunohistochemistry performed on formalin fixed, paraffin embedded material utilising Streptavidin-Biotin Amplification and anti-p53 antibody (Zymed, USA). The correlation tests of Pearson and Spearman, and multivariate stepwise logistic regression analysis were used for statistical analysis. The median follow-up was 27 months. The positiveness of anti-p53 antibody was detected in 26 patients (38%). Of these, 15 patients had high-stage (T2) tumor, one had TaG3 tumor and others had stage T1G3 tumor. The overexpression of tumor p53 protein was positive in 37 patients (54%), whereas 24 patients had a combination of serum anti-p53 antibody and the overexpression of tumor p53 protein (65%). The survival of the patients who had positive serum anti-p53 antibody was worse than the patients who had positive tumour p53 protein. There was a correlation between the presence of anti-p53 antibody and the tumor stage (p=0.000), grade (p=0.000), the overexpression of tumor p53 protein (p=0.000) and death (p=0.001).