Prognostic value of E-cadherin expression in thyroid follicular carcinoma *

Abstract Aims To evaluate the expression of E-cadherin, its association with various clinicopathological features and its possible relation with distant metastasis-free survival (DMFS) in follicular carcinoma of the thyroid. Methods E-cadherin expression was assessed immunohistochemically in sections from paraffin embedded tissues in a group of 54 patients with follicular carcinoma and its variants who were followed for a median of 7.25 years. Results Reduced E-cadherin expression, defined as P P =0.0002), moderately/poorly differentiated tumours ( P P =0.0001). In multivariate analysis, the degree of invasiveness and E-cadherin expression were the only independent prognostic factors. Among widely invasive cases, those with reduced E-cadherin expression had significantly worse DMFS than those with preserved expression. Conclusions Our findings suggest that E-cadherin expression could be used as a prognostic marker in widely invasive follicular carcinomas of the thyroid. Larger studies are needed to assess its prognostic value in the group of minimally invasive carcinomas.