The Effects of Cyclin D1 and Bcl-2 Expressıon on Aggressive Behavior in Basal Cell and Basosquamous Carcinoma.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE Clinical behavior of basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is known to be different according to histological growth pattern and basosquamous cell carcinomas (BSC) are known with their aggressive behavior and metastatic capacity. In this study, we evaluated bcl-2 and cyclin D1 expressions in BCC and BSC cases comparatively, to explore their predictive value on the aggressive behavior of these tumors. METHODS One hundred tumors belong to 92 patients diagnosed as basal cell carcinoma and basosquamous carcinoma were studied. Basal cell carcinomas were classified as aggressive and non-aggressive types according to growth pattern. Number of Cyclin D1 and bcl-2 positive cells in immunohistochemically stained serial sections were scored as low (0-1 +) and high (2 and 3+) in all tumors. RESULTS A statistically significant difference was found between non-aggressive (nodular type) and aggressive types (micronodular, infiltrative types and BSC) for these markers ( P <0.005). Cyclin D1 was higher in the aggressive group, while bcl-2 was lower in the aggressive group compared to the non-aggressive group. CONCLUSION Higher Cyclin D1 and lower bcl-2 scores was correlated with aggressive tumor types and these results could be used as markers to predict aggressive behavior in BCC and BSCs.