Background: The aim of this study was to explore the relationships of HPIP expression status with the clinicopathological variables and survival outcomes of patients with cervical cancer (CC).
Methods: We compared the HPIP expression of 119 samples from CC tissues, 20 from cervical intraepithelial tissues, and 20 from normal cervical tissues by using immunohistochemical staining.
Results: It was observed that the ratio of elevated HPIP expression was higher in CC tissues than in cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (P =0.017) and normal cervical tissues (P =0.001). In addition, there was an association between HPIP and clinicopathological factors, such as histological grade (P <0.001), stromal infiltration (P =0.015), lymph node metastasis (P <0.001), lymphovascular space invasion (LVSI; P =0.026), and recurrence (P =0.029). Furthermore, multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed that high HPIP expression (P =0.027 and P =0.042) as well as the International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics stage (P =0.003 and P =0.009), lymph node metastasis (P =0.031 and P =0.017), and LVSI (P =0.024 and P =0.046) were independent prognostic factors. In addition, we demonstrated that high HPIP expression (P =0.003) and LVSI (P <0.001) were independently related to lymph node metastasis.
Conclusion: Elevated HPIP expression may contribute to the progression and metastasis of CC and may also serve as a new biomarker to predict the prognosis of CC.
Keywords: HPIP, cervical cancer, metastasis, progression, prognosis