Differential expression of OPN, VEGF-A, and HIF-1α and its clinical significance in hepatocellular carcinoma

Objective To investigate the expression patterns of osteopontin (OPN) , vascular endothelial growth factor-A (VEGF-A) , and hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) in primary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and determine the clinical significance of this differential expression profile.Methods Immunohistochemical staining of OPN, VEGF-A, and HIF-1α was carried out on primary HCC tissues from 90 patients, HCC-adjacent cirrhosis tissues from 20 of those patients, and normal liver tissues from 15 healthy controls.Correlations between expression levels and HCC clinicopathological characteristics were assessed by Spearman's correlation coefficient.Results The majority of HCC tissues showed positive immunostaining for OPN (69/90, 76.67%) , VEGF-A (64/90, 71.11%) , and HIF-1α (66/90, 73.33%) .OPN-and VEGF-A-positivity were significantly higher than the results from the cirrhosis tissues and normal tissues.HIF-1α-positivity was similar between the HCC and cirrhosis tissues, but both were significantly different from the normal tissues.The differential expressions of OPN, VEGF-A, and HIF-1α were significantly correlated with tumor thrombus, capsular integrity, tumor differentiation and stage, and metastasis (P<0.05) .Conclusion HCC tissues overexpress OPN, VEGF-A, and HIF-1α and this differential profile may be related to HCC progression.Future investigations of this triad of factors may provide novel insights into the biological characteristics of HCC and reveal important targets of molecular therapy.