Correlation between IL-6 expression and epithelial-mesenchy-maltransitions in gastric cancer and its clinical significance        MA Fei*, ZHANG Ming-di, WANG Ya-jie. *Department of Oncology, Xin Hua Hospital Affiliated to Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200092, China
Corresponding author: WANG Ya-jie, E-mail: njl1@163.com
Abstract    Objective    To investigate the relationship between IL-6 expression and epithelial-mesenchy-maltransitions（EMT）in gastric cancer and to study its effect on infiltration, metastasis and the prognosis of patients with gastric cancer. Methods    The expressions of IL-6, Twist, E-cadherin and Vimentin in 60 cases of gastric cancer and 60 cases of normal mucosa tissues were detected by using immunohistochemistry. Results    Significant overexpression of IL-6, Twist and Vimentin, low-expression of E-cadherin were observed in gastric cancer and they were correlated with differentiation degree, TNM stage, lymph node metastasis, infiltrated depth and short survival time rather than gender, age and tumor size. The expression of IL-6 was correlated positively with the expression of Twist and Vimentin, negatively with the expression of E-cadherin. Conclusion    IL-6 positive expression is related to EMT-related factors, metastasis of gastric cancer and clinical prognostic factors, which might be valuable basis for the study of infiltration, metastasis and prognosis.