Assessment of Correlation between Cyclo oxygen ase-2 Expression and Clinicopathological Features of Colorectal Carcinoma

Background: Cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) is believed to be an important enzyme in the pathogenesis of Colorectal Cancer (CRC). Various studies examined the relationship between COX-2 overexpression with the clinical outcome in patients with colorectal cancer, but yielded conflicting results. The prognostic significance of COX-2 overexpression in colorectal cancer remains controversial.Aire of she Work: To assess Cуclooхуgenase-2 (COX-2) expression in colorectal adenocarcinomas and to find correlations with different clincopathological features.Patients and Methods: Thirty patients with colorectal carcinomas treated by colonic resection were studied for the expression of COX-2 by Immunohistochemistry (IHC). Their expression was interpreted in relation to adjacent normal colonic mucosa and analyzed in correlation with various clinicopathologic parameters. Results: Our results showed that in normal adjacent colonic tnucosa. COX-2 was completely absent. COХ2 staining was positive in 86% of examined CRC specimens while 13 cases showed negative expression for СOX2. We established statistically significant relationships between СOX2 expression and presence of metastasis (р-value=0.038) and borderline significance with Dukes stage (p-value 0.06). Conclusion: Overexpression of COX-2 protein in colorectal carcinoma in contrast to normal mucosa suggests its role in cell proliferation in carcinogenesis. Increased expression of COХ2 could be used as a marker of tumour progression. However, the prognostic value of COX-2 in colorectal cancer still needs further large-scale prospective trials to be clarified.