The Significance of p53 Immunostaining in Various Surface Epithelial Carcinomas of The Ovary

Background: Ovarian Carcinoma (OC) is the 8th most prevalent cancer incidence among women globally. Its pathogenesis is not well understood till now. p53 is commonly mutated in human malignancies and has been a prominent subject of investigation in the field of oncology. Methods: The current study included 52 cases of epithelial ovarian carcinoma (EOC). 19 cases (36.5%) were serous ovarian carcinoma, 18 cases (34.6%) were mucinous ovarian carcinoma, 8 cases (15.4%) were clear cell ovarian carcinoma, 5 cases (9.6%) were endometrioid ovarian carcinoma and 2 cases (3.8%) were malignant Brenner tumors. The p53 antibody immunohistochemistry was conducted using the avidin-biotin peroxidase complex technique. Results: p53 was positive in 96.2% of EOC cases. Statistically significant association was detected between p53 expression and patients’ age, tumors’ grade and tumors’ stage (p-value= 0.012, 0.012 and 0.047 respectively). No significant association was found between mutant p53 expression and other clinicopathological variables. Conclusions: Mutant type of p53 expression is significantly associated with poor prognostic factors including older age, higher grade and advanced stage, thus can be used as a prognostic indicator for epithelial ovarian carcinoma patients.