The value of immunohistochemical expression of BAX in formulating a prognosis for canine cutaneous mast cell tumours.

ABSTRACT

Immunohistochemical expression of BAX was evaluated in 24 canine cutaneous mast cell tumours in order to verify the relationship of this expression to the histopathological grade of the lesions and its prognostic value for clinical outcome. BAX expression increased with higher histopathological grades (P=0.0148; P<0.05 between grades I and III). Animals with high levels of BAX expression were 4.25 times more likely to die from the disease and had shorter post-surgical survival times (P=0.0009). These results suggest that alterations in BAX expression may be related to the aggressiveness of canine cutaneous mast cell tumours, indicating that immunohistochemical detection of BAX may be predictive of clinical outcome.