Objective: The aim of this study was to reveal the relations between expression and tumor behavior such as invasion, metastasis and prognosis in oral squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) through analyzing the expression of urokinase-type plasminogen activator (UPA).
Methods: With Labelled streptavidin biotin method (LsAB), the expression of UPA was analyzed in 80 cases of oral squamous cell carcinoma, 10 cases of oral normal mucosa and 10 cases of oral leukoplakia.
Results: Compared to oral normal mucosa and oral leukoplakia, the expression of UPA was significantly higher in SCC. The expression of UPA in SCC cases with lymph node metastasis was significantly higher than in cases without metastasis. The expression in cases with good prognosis was significantly higher than in those with poor prognosis and the expression was significantly higher in cases with invasive growth than in those with ulcerative and papillary growth.
Conclusion: The results obtained indicated that high expression of UPA in SCC might be closely related to lymph node metastasis, invasive growth and poor prognosis.