Apoptosis and Ki-67 as predictive factors for response to radiation therapyin feline nasal lymphomas

[摘要] References(38)Nasal lymphoma is the most common nasal tumor in cats and is generally a solitary andradiosensitive tumor. We retrospectively evaluated the response to radiation and survivaltime in relation to apoptosis and Ki-67 indices in feline nasal lymphomas treated withradiation therapy. The apoptotic and Ki-67 indices were evaluated with TUNEL andimmunohistochemical staining in 30 biopsy tissues that were taken before any treatment.These two indices were compared, and differences between different treatment responsegroups were analyzed. The correlation between the median survival times (MST) and theindices was estimated using the Kaplan Meier method, and statistical differences betweensurvival curves were analyzed using a log-rank method. With regard to apoptotic index, astatistical difference was observed between the samples taken from cats with completeresponse and stable disease (1.22% vs. 0.45%; P=0.045). The Ki-67 indexin cats with both complete response and partial response was significantly higher than incats with stable disease (44.4% and 39.6% vs. 16.3%; P<0.001 andP=0.008, respectively). The cats with a high level of apoptosis(>0.9%) nasal lymphoma were not significantly prolonged MSTs(P=0.202), however, high Ki-67-positive (>40%) cats experienced astatistically significant relationship with longer survival time(P=0.015). Our results indicate that spontaneous apoptotic and Ki-67indices are strong predictors for response to radiation therapy in feline nasallymphomas.

[学科分类] 兽医学

[关键词] apoptosis;feline nasal lymphoma;ki-67;radiation therapy;survival