BACKGROUND: Gastric cancer continues to defy the modern medicine in the understanding of its biological behavior and surgical cure. AIM: To determine, compare and correlate the expression of caspase-3 and CD34 in gastric adenocarcinoma with clinical and pathological factors and proximal/distal gastric tumors. METHODS: Imunohistochemistry quantitative analysis of the antibodies anti-caspase-3 polyclonal of rabbit and CD43 mouse's monoclonal, to mark adenocarcinoma cells in 26 CD34's cases and 22 caspase-3 paraffined blocks were used. The parameters were: labeling index in percentage and optic density. RESULTS: Caspase-3 and CD34 expression were elevated; the average and the deviation standard for labeling index were respectively 87,72% ±7,89 and 84,86% ±9,17; for optic desity 60,75±7,46 and 49,84±8.48. When markers were compared with optic density it was found significant differences between caspase-3 (60,94) and CD34 (50,27). Caspase-3 average (60,94) was higher than CD34 (50,27), P<0.001. The correlation among markers was positive for CD34's optic density versus labeling index of CD34 (P=0.006, r=0,520) and for optic density of caspase-3 versus caspase-3 labeling index (P=0.015, r=0.512). The markers had no correlation in the comparison of labeling index and optic densities with the gastric curvature, tumor differentiation, Borrmann classification and lymphatic invasion. Gender and age also did not correlate with the markers. The correlation with the tumor location had differences favoring the ones on distal part. CONCLUSION: Caspase-3 and CD34 expressions are elevated in gastric adenocarcinoma. Caspase-3 optic density is higher than CD34's optic density. There is no expression and quantification correlation between markers and the clinical and pathological factors, but there are evidences that they have biological differences when in different gastric anatomical parts.
CD34; Caspase-3; Cytophotometry
