PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Fang, D C
AU  - Jass, J R
AU  - Wang, D X
AU  - Zhou, X D
AU  - Luo, Y H
AU  - Young, J
TI  - Infrequent loss of heterozygosity of APC/MCC and DCC genes in gastric cancer showing DNA microsatellite instability.
AID  - 10.1136/jcp.52.7.504
DP  - 1999 Jul 01
TA  - Journal of Clinical Pathology
PG  - 504--508
VI  - 52
IP  - 7
4099  - http://jcp.bmj.com/content/52/7/504.short
4100  - http://jcp.bmj.com/content/52/7/504.full
SO  - J Clin Pathol1999 Jul 01; 52
AB  - AIM: To investigate the role of DNA microsatellite instability (MSI) in gastric carcinogenesis by studying associations between MSI status, clinicopathological features, and loss of genetic loci. METHODS: Six microsatellite loci and loss of heterozygosity at APC, DCC, and MCC were analysed by polymerase chain reaction based methods in 53 cases of advanced gastric cancer. RESULTS: MSI was observed in 32.1% of gastric carcinomas (17/53) and 20% of foci of intestinal metaplasia (3/15). Seven gastric carcinomas (13.7%) were MSI-high (MSI-H) (three loci or more) and 10 (18.9%) were MSI-low (MSI-L) (one or two loci). The frequency of MSI-H was higher in intestinal (25.0%) than in diffuse carcinomas (3.7%) (p < 0.05). None of the MSI-H tumours showed loss of heterozygosity at APC, MCC, or DCC loci. CONCLUSIONS: MSI may have an important and early role in a subset of gastric cancers, particularly the intestinal type. The MSI-H subset of gastric cancer has features in common with its colorectal counterpart, whereas MSI-L and microsatellite stable cancers appear to develop through the loss of heterozygosity pathway.