Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Apr 15:9:859144.
doi: 10.3389/fmed.2022.859144. eCollection 2022.

Clinicopathological and Prognostic Significance of Stromal Patterns in Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Yusuke Amano  1 , Atsushi Kihara  1 , Masayo Hasegawa  1 , Tamaki Miura  1 , Daisuke Matsubara  1 , Noriyoshi Fukushima  1 , Hiroshi Nishino  2 , Yoshiyuki Mori  3 , Toshiro Niki  1
Affiliations

Clinicopathological and Prognostic Significance of Stromal Patterns in Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Yusuke Amano et al. Front Med (Lausanne). .

Abstract

Background: Stromal patterns (SP), especially desmoplastic reactions, have recently gained attention as indicators of malignant potential in cancer. In this study, we explored the clinicopathological and prognostic significance of the SP in oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC).

Materials and methods: We reviewed 232 cases of surgically resected OSCC that were not treated with neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. We categorized the SP of the OSCC into four groups: immune/inflammatory (84 cases), mature (14 cases), intermediate (78 cases), or immature (56 cases).

Results: The SP category was significantly associated with various clinicopathological factors, such as the histological grade, lymphovascular invasion, neural invasion, and a diffuse invasion pattern. For each of the factors, the immune/inflammatory type was associated with favorable categories, while the immature type was associated with unfavorable categories (p ≤ 0.001). The SP category was also shown to be a prognostic predictor: the 5-year relapse-free survival (RFS) rate was 72.0% for the immune/inflammatory type, 66.7% for the intermediate/mature type, and 31.2% for the immature type (p < 0.0001), and the 5-year overall survival (OS) rate was 85.1% for the immune/inflammatory type, 76.4% for the intermediate/mature type, and 50.0% for the immature type (p < 0.0001). In multivariate analyses, the SP category was identified as an independent prognostic factor for RFS and OS.

Conclusion: Our SP categorization method provides valuable prognostic information in OSCC.

Keywords: desmoplastic reaction; epithelial-mesenchymal transition; oral squamous cell carcinoma; prognosis; stromal pattern.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Flow chart of the stromal pattern (SP) categorization process.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Categorization of SP. (A) The inflammatory type involves an inconspicuous desmoplastic reaction and lymphocytic infiltration into the stroma (as shown). (B) The mature type involves a fibrotic stroma lacking keloid-like collagen and a myxoid stroma. (C) The intermediate type can be identified based on the presence of keloid-like collagen (i.e., fragmented broad bands of collagen exhibiting brightly eosinophilic hyalinization, similar to those seen in a keloid). (D) The immature type can be identified based on abundant amorphous extracellular matrix material in a myxoid stroma. Bar: 100 μm.
Figure 3
Figure 3
(A) Kaplan-Meier curves of recurrence-free survival based on the SP. (B) Kaplan-Meier curves of overall survival based on the SP. *p < 0.001; NS, not significant.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Miranda-Filho A, Bray F. Global patterns and trends in cancers of the lip, tongue and mouth. Oral Oncol. (2020) 102:104551. 10.1016/j.oraloncology.2019.104551 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Noguti J, De Moura CF, De Jesus GP, Da Silva VH, Hossaka TA, Oshima CT, et al. . Metastasis from oral cancer: an overview. Cancer Genomics Proteomics. (2012) 9:329–36. - PubMed
    1. Sasahira T, Kirita T, Kuniyasu H. Update of molecular pathobiology in oral cancer: a review. Int J Clin Oncol. (2014) 19:431–6. 10.1007/s10147-014-0684-4 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Brierley JD. GM and WC UICC TNM Classification of Malignant Tumours. 8th Edn. New York: Wiley Blackwell; (2017).
    1. Schiavoni G, Gabriele L, Mattei F. The tumor microenvironment: a pitch for multiple players. Front Oncol. (2013) 3:90. 10.3389/fonc.2013.00090 - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources