Expression of osteopontin in different pathological stages of primary biliary cholangitis

Abstract

Abstract: Objective To detect the expression of osteopontin (OPN) in liver tissues at different pathological stages of primary biliary cholangitis (PBC), and to explore the role of OPN in the PBC progression.Methods A retrospective analysis of the liver pathology of the Department of Pathology, Beijing You’an Hospital, Capital Medical University, from December 2013 to January 2020. HE, Masson and Gomori silver staining were combined to evaluate the pathological changes and fibrosis of PBC liver at different pathological stages. CK19, CK7 and OPN antibodies were used to study bile duct injury and OPN expression in PBC liver tissue. Nonparametric Spearman correlation was used to analyze the correlation between PBC pathological stage and OPN pathological score.Results A total of 70 PBC cases were included. The serum anti-mitochondrial antibody (AMA) was positive, including 10 males (14.29%), with an average age of (53 ± 9) years and 60 females (85.71%) , the average age was (51 ± 11) years old, and the ratio of female to male was 6:1. The patients with PBC pathological stages 1-4 were 18, 17, 18 and 17 respectively, and the average ages were (48 ± 12) years old, (48 ± 12) years old, (53 ± 9) years old and (56 ± 7) years old respectively. Compared with the average age of patients with PBC stage 1, the patients with stage 4 were older (P=0.026). With the progression of PBC, hepatic fibrosis and bile duct injury gradually aggravated. Compared with PBC pathological stage 1 (χ²=12.586, P<0.001) and stage 2 (χ²=21.394, P<0.001) and stage 4 (χ²=4.972, P=0.026), the rate of strong expression of OPN immunohistochemical score increased significantly in PBC pathological stage 3 (83.33%). OPN positive cells could be seen occasionally in stage 1 PBC portal area, but different from stage 1 PBC, the number of OPN positive cells in stage 2 to 4 PBC liver portal area increased significantly. Nonparametric Spearman correlation analysis showed that there was a certain correlation between PBC pathological stage and OPN pathological score (r=0.396, P=0.001).Conclusion After PBC developes into hepatic fibrosis, the expression of OPN in liver tissue increases significantly, and the high expression rate of OPN decreases after liver cirrhosis. The high expression of OPN not only indicates the aggravation of bile duct immune injury load, but also indicates the strong ability of liver tissue proliferation. The close combination of OPN and PBC pathological stage has important clinical value for evaluating the severity of the disease and predicting the prognosis of patients.

Key words: Primary biliary cholangitis, Liver pathological stage, Osteopontin

WANG Yan-kun, MA Jun-ji. Expression of osteopontin in different pathological stages of primary biliary cholangitis[J]. Chinese Hepatolgy, 2022, 27(6): 693-697.

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