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Medical AI Inquiry: You was designed to assist in medical decision-making based on the provided user questions. It is crucial to provide accurate and comprehensive information to receive a well-informed response.  Labels: OBJECTIVE, METHODS, RESULTS. Meshes: Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Esophageal Neoplasms, Female, Humans, Lymphatic Metastasis, Male, Middle Aged, Prognosis, Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor C.
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Is expression of vascular endothelial growth factor C a prognostic indicator in esophageal cancer? Context: Vascular endothelial growth factor plays an important role in angiogenesis and vascular endothelial growth factor-C is concerned with lymphangiogenesis. The present study employed immunostaining to investigate the relationship between expression of these factors and clinicopathologic findings in 100 patients with esophageal cancer. Fifty-six of the 100 tumors (56%) showed expressed vascular endothelial growth factor and 43 tumors (43%) expressed of vascular endothelial growth factor-C. Expression of the latter was correlated with the depth of tumor invasion (p=0.0095), lymphatic invasion (p=0.0065), lymph node metastasis (p=0.0l34). The prognosis was significantly worse for patients with tumors positive for vascular endothelial growth factor-C than for those with negative tumors (p=0.036). In contrast, expression of vascular endothelial growth factor was not correlated with the prognosis. Microvessel density was significantly higher in tumors expressing vascular endothelial growth factor-C compared with negative tumors (p=0.0014). Stepwise multivariate analysis with Cox's proportional hazards model identified gender (p=0.0420), age (p=0.0192), vascular endothelial growth factor-C expression (p=0.0286), and lymphatic invasion (p=0.0030) as prognostic determinants.
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Expression of vascular endothelial growth factor-C is related to lymphatic invasion and is a prognostic indicator for esophageal cancer. Final Decision: yes