Objective: To investigate the changes of telomerase activities in atypical hyperplasia of esophageal mucosal epithelium and esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and to study the association of telomerase activity with differentiation, invasiveness, and lymphatic metastasis of cancer.
Methods: The telomerase activities of esophageal SCC tissues, adjacent tissue with dysplasia, and normal mucosal epithelium from surgical edge of 45 cases were detected by microdissection-TRAP (Telomeric Repeat Amplification Protocol)-silver assay.
Results: The telomerase activity rates were 79.3% (23/29) in atypical displastic epithelium, 82.2% (37/45) in SCC tissue, and only 5% (2/40) in normal epithelium. The difference of telpmerase activity between dysplastic and normal esophageal epithelia was highly significant (P < 0.01). In the same cancer tissue the differences of telomerase activity among cancer nests to different degrees of defferentiation and to different depths were not significant (P > 0.05). The positive rate of telomerase activity was significantly higher in cases with lymphatic metastasis than in cases without lymphatic metastasis (P < 0.05).
Conclusion: The telomerase activities is increased in esophageal SCC tissue and adjacent atypical dysplastic tissue. The telomerase activity in SCC tissue is related to lymphatic metastasis but not related to cancer differentiation.