Expression of urokinase-type plasminogen activator and its receptorin squamous cell carcinoma of the oral tongue

Abstract

Urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA) and its receptor(uPAR) act in the proteolysis of basement membrane and extracellularmatrix structures, facilitating tumor invasion. The purpose of thisstudy was to evaluate the relationship between these proteinsand clinicopathological parameters in squamous cell carcinomaof the oral tongue (SCCOT). Sixty cases of SCCOT were submittedto immunohistochemistry and analyzed semiquantitatively at theinvasion front and in the tumor core. The results were associated withlymph node metastasis, clinical stage, locoregional recurrence, clinicaloutcome and histological grade of malignancy. A higher expression ofuPA was observed in cases of tumors of high-grade versus low-grademalignancy (p = 0.010). Moreover, the cases with the worst pattern ofinvasion presented an overexpression of uPA (p = 0.011). The presenceof locoregional recurrence was associated with uPAR (p = 0.039), andthe expression of both biomarkers was much higher at the invasionfront than in the tumor core (p < 0.001). The results suggest uPA anduPAR are involved in the progression and aggressiveness of SCCOT,mainly at the tumor-host interface