The effect of apoptotic activity, survivin, Ki-67, and P-glycoprotein expression on prognosis in pancreatic carcinoma

Objectives: The pathogenetic mechanisms that regulate the aggressive behavior of pancreatic cancer still remain to be clarified. Alterations in the apoptotic pathway and proliferative activity of tumor cells as well as mechanisms contributing to the intrinsic drug resistance of pancreatic tumors have been investigated. Survivin is a recently described antiapoptotic protein, which, when overexpressed, is associated with worse prognosis in a majority of tumors. P-glycoprotein, a product of multidrug resistance gene-1 (MDR-1) was reported to be expressed in drug-resistant tumors. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether apoptosis, its regulation by survivin, tumor cell proliferation, and P-glycoprotein expression have a significant role on the biologic behavior of pancreatic adenocarcinoma