Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Thymidine phosphorylase and blood vessel growth in dog breast tumors
By Zizzo, Nicola et al.·Published in Frontiers in veterinary science·2019·Department of Veterinary Medicine, Italy·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Thymidine Phosphorylase Expression and Microvascular Density Correlation Analysis in Canine Mammary Tumor: Possible Prognostic Factor in Breast Cancer.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A study looked at 68 dogs with mammary tumors to see if a specific enzyme called thymidine phosphorylase (TP) could help predict how severe the cancer was. The dogs, aged around 9.5 years, had tumors ranging from 5 to 12 cm and were not treated with chemotherapy. Researchers found that higher levels of TP in the tumor cells were linked to increased blood vessel growth in more severe tumors (grades 2 and 3). This suggests that measuring TP levels could help veterinarians understand the seriousness of mammary tumors in dogs and guide treatment decisions.
People also search for: dog mammary tumor prognosis · thymidine phosphorylase in dogs · canine breast cancer treatment options
Abstract
The thymidine phosphorylase (TP) is a key enzyme involved in the metabolism of pyrimidines. Inhibition or downregulation of this enzyme causes accumulation of metabolites with consequences in DNA replication. TP regulates angiogenesis and chemotactic activity of endothelial cells. Different studies showed the presence of TP upregulation in human cancer but the correlation between TP expression and the microvascular density (MVD) in canine mammary tumors is unknown. The aim of this study was to investigate a possible correlation between the MVD and TP expression in tumor cells of canine mammary tumors of different degree of severity (G1-G3) by immunohistochemical analysis.Sixty-eight samples of spontaneous mammary neoplasia of 5-12 cm in diameter were collected from purebred and mixed-breed dogs (mean aged = 9.5 ± 7), not subject to chemotherapy treatments in veterinary clinics. Histopathological analysis and immunostaining were performed.Carcinoma simple samples have been classified as 72.06% of tubule-papillary, 20.59% cysto-papillary, and 7.35% tubular carcinomas. Immunostainings revealed a marked cytoplasmic expression of TP in 30.88% of samples, mild in 32.35%, weaker in 22.07%, and negative in 14.70%. The correlation analysis and two-way ANOVA showed a linear correlation between MVD and TP with a coefficient of correlation () > 0.5 (< 0.05) in G2 and G3. No correlation between variables was found in G1.These findings suggest that cytoplasmic TP overexpression is correlated with microvascular density in canine mammary tumors, in severe grade, and it can be a potential prognostic factor in breast cancer.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31709268/