6th ESACP Congress, Heidelberg, April 7-11, 1999

A161
INFLUENCE OF CONSUMPTION OF HOT ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES ON EXPRESSION OF KI67 PROLIFERATION MARKER, P53 PROTEIN AND CHRONIC OESOPHAGITIS OCCURRENCE IN HUMAN OESOPHAGEAL MUCOSA
Lechevrel M 1, Launoy G 1, Marnay J 2, Sichel F 1, Gauduchon P 1, Mandard AM 2

1 Centre F.Baclesse and CHRU, GRECAN, Caen, 2 Laboratoire d'Anatomiue Pathologique, Centre F. Baclesse, Caen, France

The apple brandy "calvados" and other spirits are strongly related to the risk of oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma when consumed with hot beverages and/or tobacco. In order to study the relationship between exposure to alcoholic beverages, tobacco, practice of drinking spirits and incidence of precancerous lesions in oesophagitis area, a retrospective study was carried out on oesophageal mucosa biopsies collected in a region with high incidence for oesophageal cancer, namely Normandy. 22 biopsies from healthy volunteers were analyzed and compared to non neoplastic mucosa collected on 12 surgical specimen of cancer resection at distance of the tumour. Epidemiological data concerning smoking, alcohol consumption and alimentary habits were available for all individuals. Formalin fixed and paraffin embedded histological sections were immunostained for the Ki67 proliferation marker and the p53 tumor suppressor protein. A quantitative study of the distribution of Ki67 positive nuclei was performed in the tree layers of the epithelium using a stereological approach. Chronic oesophagitis was observed in 100 % of the patients and 68 % of the volunteers. An increased proliferative rate related to the severity of oesophagitis was observed in all specimen presenting an oesophagitis, especially in the suprabasal layers and along the elongated intraepithelial stoma papillae. p53 immunostaining was also observed in oesophagitis areas.In an attempt to correlate proliferative activity, degree of oesophagitis and epidemiological data, two quantitative informations were obtained from the same histological sections of mucosa: Ki67 score expressed as the numerical density of immunostained nuclei and a B/L ratio which corresponds to the length of basal cell layer per unit length of exposed superficial epithelial layer. A significant correlation (p=0.04) was obtained in healthy volunteers between B/L ratio and consumption of hot alcoholic beverages, in particular calvados. These preliminary results underline that prevalence of chronic oesophagitis in high risk population could be related to drinking spirits with hot beverages.