High gene expression of matrix metalloproteinase-7 is associated with early stages of oral cancer.
BACKGROUND
In the light of the recently found contribution of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) to oral oncogenesis, the correlation of MMP-7 with risk for oral cancer was investigated.


METHODS
The MMP-7 -181A/G polymorphism in 159 German and Greek patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma and 120 healthy controls of equivalent gender and ethnicity was studied.


RESULTS
The detected carrier frequency of the high expression G allele was significantly higher in patients compared to controls (74.8% versus 61.7%, p = 0.0257). This significant difference was more pronounced in patients with early stages of cancer and absent in those with advanced stages. A/G heterozygotes have a double relative risk (OR 2.07, 95%, CI 1.17-3.67) of developing early stages of oral cancer than low expression A/A homozygotes.


CONCLUSIONS
MMP-7 gene expression is associated with increased risk only for early stages of oral cancer, possibly due to the inhibitory effect of MMP-7 in angiogenesis.
Vairaktaris
Eleftherios
E
Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, University of Athens Medical School, "Attikon" Hospital, Athens, Greece. Ivairakt@med.uoa.gr
Serefoglou
Zoe
Z
Yapijakis
Christos
C
Vylliotis
Antonis
A
Nkenke
Emeka
E
Derka
Spyridoula
S
Vassiliou
Stavros
S
Avgoustidis
Dimitrios
D
Neukam
Friedrich W
FW
Patsouris
Efstratios
E
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000483:Alleles; D002294:Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / Q000201:enzymology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D020783:Matrix Metalloproteinase 7 / Q000096:biosynthesis* / Q000235:genetics; D008875:Middle Aged; D009062:Mouth Neoplasms / Q000201:enzymology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D020641:Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide
D020783:Matrix Metalloproteinase 7