Expression of p63 and p73 in acoustic neuroma and its possible clinical relevance

Abstract

Objectives: Assess p63 and p73 expression in acoustic neuroma and its correlation with clinical and radiological findings.

Materials and methods: medical records of 34 patients who were operated on for acoustic neuroma during a 3-year period (2001-2003) were evaluated retrospectively. Immunohistochemical analysis of the schwannoma was performed with p63 and p73 antibodies and clinical patient characteristics were correlated with the immunoreactivity results.

Results: 41% of the acoustic neuroma specimens showed p63 and p73 staining. Correlation between both proteins was 100%. Age of the patients tended to be older when staining was positive, but no statistical significance was achieved. Likewise, tumour size was bigger for positive tumours but, again, this difference was not statistically significant. There was no correlation between gender and immunostaining.

Discussion and conclusions: Expression of p63 and p73 was demonstrated in almost half of the patients studied. Although both proteins were more prevalent in older patients and bigger tumours, this difference was not statistically significant, probably due to the reduced sample size. No differences were found in laterality, gender or audiogram. However, the expression of these two proteins in almost half of the tumours shows that they can play a role in the development and progression of acoustic neuromas, although further studies are needed.