Objective: To investigate the expression of promyelocytic leukaemia (PML) protein of PML protein in Bowen's disease (BD), skin squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and basal cell carcinoma (BCC) and explore the role of PML in the pathogenesis of these diseases.
Methods: PML protein in normal skin tissues and lesions of Bowen's disease, SCC and BCC were detected with immunohistochemistry.
Results: Normal skin tissues did not express PML protein. In BCC, PML showed rather low expressions in the skin lesions (8.69% in cell nuclei and 4.35% in cytoplasm). The lesions in BD and SCC (grade I and II) showed obvious overexpression of PML protein in the cell nuclei and cytoplasm, and its expression in the cell nuclei of these lesions was significantly higher than that in grade III-IV SCC.
Conclusion: PML protein may play an important role in the early stage of SCC, and its overexpression may contribute to the carcinogenesis and metastasis of SCC.