Value of Mesothelin Immunostaining in the Diagnosis of Mesothelioma Nelson G. Ordóñez, M.D. University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas tained with the standard panel of immunohisto- Mesothelin is a cell surface antigen of unknown chemical markers used for the diagnosis of me- function that is strongly expressed in mesothelial sotheliomas are equivocal. Because mesothelin is a cells. Although it was reported in 1992 that immu- highly sensitive positive marker for epithelioid me- nostaining with the K1 anti-mesothelin antibody sotheliomas, a negative staining for this marker is could be very useful in distinguishing between epi- an indication against such a diagnosis; however, thelioid mesotheliomas and pulmonary adenocar- because of its limited utility, it is not recommended cinomas, no further studies have been published on for inclusion in the standard panel of immunohis- the value of this marker in the diagnosis of me- tochemical markers used in the distinction between sotheliomas. To determine whether mesothelin can mesotheliomas and adenocarcinomas. assist in discriminating epithelioid mesotheliomas from lung adenocarcinomas or from other carcino- KEY WORDS: Adenocarcinoma, Immunohisto- mas metastatic to the serosal membranes, 55 me- chemistry, Mesothelin, Mesothelioma. sotheliomas (44 epithelioid, 3 biphasic, and 8 sar- Mod Pathol 2003;16(3):192–197 comatoid), 48 carcinomas of the lung (31 adenocarcinomas, 17 squamous carcinomas), and A well-known problem in surgical pathology is the 86 nonpulmonary adenocarcinomas (14 ovary, 5 distinction of pleural mesothelioma from periph- peritoneum, 9 endometrium, 11 pancreas, 4 stom- eral pulmonary adenocarcinoma involving the ach, 16 colon, 12 breast, 9 kidney, 4 thyroid, and 2 pleura or from a metastatic adenocarcinoma origi- prostate) were investigated for mesothelin expres- nating from a distant organ and presenting as a sion using the recently available 5B2 anti- tumor of unknown origin. This differential diagno- mesothelin monoclonal antibody. Reactivity was sis, however, has been greatly facilitated by the use obtained in all 44 (100%) of the epithelioid me- of immunohistochemical markers. Because a spe- sotheliomas, 12 (39%) of the lung adenocarcino- cific marker for mesothelioma has not yet been mas, and 42 (49%) of the nonpulmonary adenocar- identified, the immunohistochemical diagnosis de- cinomas (14 [100%] ovary; 5 [100%] peritoneum; 6 pends on the use of panels of markers that until [67%] endometrium; 10 [91%] pancreas; 2 [50%] recently were composed primarily of antibodies stomach; 5 [31%] colon; and in none [0] of the that frequently reacted with adenocarcinomas but breast, kidney, thyroid, or prostate). Three (18%) of not with mesotheliomas (1–4). Since the mid-1990s, the squamous carcinomas of the lung, but none of however, a large number of antibodies that com- the sarcomatoid mesotheliomas, exhibited positiv- monly react with mesotheliomas, but not with ad- ity for this marker, nor was any reactivity seen in enocarcinomas, have become available (3, 5–12). the spindle cell component of the biphasic me- In 1992, using the K1 anti-mesothelin monoclo- sotheliomas. It is concluded that despite the low nal antibody on frozen tissue specimens, Chang et specificity of mesothelin for discriminating between al. (13) reported mesothelin expression in all of 15 epithelioid mesotheliomas and adenocarcinomas, epithelioid mesotheliomas but in none of 23 pul- immunostaining for this marker may have some monary adenocarcinomas. On the basis of this ob- utility in those instances in which the results ob- servation, those investigators concluded that me- sothelin immunostaining could be useful in Copyright © 2003 by The United States and Canadian Academy of discriminating between these two malignancies. Pathology, Inc. VOL. 16, NO. 3, P. 192, 2003 Printed in the U.S.A. Despite such promising results, no other investiga- Date of acceptance: January 8, 2003. tions on the value of mesothelin in the diagnosis of Address reprint requests to: Nelson G. Ordóñez, M.D., M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, 1515 Holcombe Blvd., Houston, TX 77030; fax: mesothelioma have been published, and the Chang 713-792-3696. et al. (13) observation has remained unconfirmed. DOI: 10.1097/01.MP.0000056981.16578.C3 An anti-mesothelin monoclonal antibody capable 192 of reacting on routinely fixed and processed speci- a DAKO AutoStainer (Carpinteria, CA). The primary mens has recently become commercially available. antibody used was the 5B2 anti-mesothelin mono- The purpose of this study is to investigate the value clonal antibody (Novocastra, Newcastle-on-Tyne, of this antibody in the diagnosis of mesothelioma. UK; 1:30 dilution). The immunoperoxidase staining was done using the LSAB2 peroxidase kit (DAKO). To enhance the immunostaining, a heat epitope MATERIALS AND METHODS retrieval procedure was performed using a Black- The material used in this study was obtained and-Decker (Shelton, CT) vegetable steamer. from the files of the Department of Pathology at the Briefly, deparaffinized sections were placed in a University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center thermoresistant container filled with a 10:1 solution and is listed in Table 1. It consists of 55 unequivocal of Tris-EDTA buffer, pH 8.0, steamed for 45 min- mesotheliomas (44 epithelioid, 8 sarcomatoid, 3 bi- utes, then cooled for 20 minutes before immuno- phasic), 48 primary lung carcinomas (31 adenocar- staining. The antigen–antibody immunoreaction cinomas, 17 squamous carcinomas), and 86 non- was visualized using 3,3'-diaminobenzidene tetra- pulmonary carcinomas, which consisted of 14 hydrochloride as chromogen. To evaluate the spec- nonmucinous carcinomas of the ovary (11 serous ificity of the immunoreaction, known positive and and 3 endometrioid), 5 primary peritoneal serous negative tissue sections were used as controls. In carcinomas, 9 endometrial adenocarcinomas, 11 addition, sections of the tumors were stained with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas, 16 colonic ad- the universal negative control, mouse (DAKO). The enocarcinomas, 4 gastric adenocarcinomas, 12 grading of the immunostaining was performed on a breast carcinomas, 9 renal cell carcinomas, 4 pap- sliding scale of 1ϩ to 4ϩ according to the percent- illary thyroid carcinomas, and 2 prostatic adenocar- age of reactive cells (trace ϭϽ1%; 1ϩϭ1–25%; 2ϩ cinomas. The lung adenocarcinomas were diag- ϭ 26–50%; 3ϩϭ51–75%; 4ϩϭϾ76%). nosed using the World Health Organization’s criteria (14). Fifteen were acinar, 8 were papillary, 6 were solid with mucin production, and 2 were RESULTS bronchioloalveolar. For all of the mesotheliomas, the diagnosis was made using currently accepted All 44 (100%) of the epithelioid mesotheliomas histologic criteria on hematoxylin-and-eosin exhibited reactivity for mesothelin on the cell mem- stained sections combined with immunohisto- branes. This was particularly strong, thick, and uni- chemical, ultrastructural, and clinical features. All form along the apical surface (Fig. 1,A–B). A similar of these cases showed strong reactivity for calreti- staining pattern was present in the epithelioid com- nin and cytokeratin 5/6 but were negative for car- ponent of the three biphasic tumors. No reactivity cinoembryonic antigen, B72.3, and MOC-31, find- was seen in any of the eight sarcomatoid mesothe- ings that are considered to be supportive of the liomas or in the spindle cell component of the diagnosis of mesothelioma (15). Immunoperoxi- biphasic tumors. dase studies were performed on formalin-fixed, Twelve (39%) of the 31 lung adenocarcinomas paraffin-embedded tissue sections using the exhibited mesothelin reactivity. In 6 of the tu- avidin-biotin-peroxidase complex (ABC) method in mors, the staining was primarily along the apical surface of the cells; in 5, it was mixed membra- nous and cytoplasmic; and in 1, it was exclusively TABLE 1. Results of Mesothelin Immunostaining cytoplasmic (Fig. 2,A–B). Among the nonpulmo- Positive Cases (%) Trace 1ϩ 2ϩ 3ϩ 4ϩ nary carcinomas, reactivity was seen in 14 of 14 Mesotheliomas originating in the ovary, 5 of 5 in the peritoneum, Epithelioid 44/44 (100) 0 8 4 10 22 10 of 11 in the pancreas, 6 of 9 in the endome- Biphasic 3a /3 (100) 00021 Sarcomatoid 0 /8 (0) 0 0 0 0 0 trium, 5 of 16 in the colon, and 2 of 4 in the Adenocarcinomas stomach. The staining in the ovarian carcinomas Lung 12/31 (39) 0 5 3 3 1 and the primary peritoneal serous carcinomas Ovary 14/14 (100) 0 2 1 3 8 Peritoneum 5 /5 (100) 0 0 0 2 3 was usually strong and exhibited a similar pattern Endometrium 6 /9 (67) 1 2 0 1 2 to that seen in the mesotheliomas. In the papil- Pancreas 10/11 (91) 0 0 2 3 5 lary areas, the reactivity mainly occurred along Stomach 2 /4 (50) 0 1 0 1 0 Colon 5/16 (31) 1 4 0 0 0 the apical surfaces of the neoplastic cells, Breast 0/12 (0) 0 0 0 0 0 whereas in the solid areas, the entire cell mem- Kidney 0 /9 (0) 0 0 0 0 0 brane was often involved (Fig. 3,A–B). In the other Thyroid 0 /4 (0) 0 0 0 0 0 Prostate 0 /2 (0) 0 0 0 0 0 adenocarcinomas, although the staining was pri- Squamous carcinomas marily apical, some cells also presented strong Lung 3/17 (18) 0 3 0 0 0 cytoplasmic positivity (Fig. 4). Only 3 of the 17 a Only the epithelioid component was positive. squamous carcinomas of the lung were mesothe- Mesothelin Immunostaining in Mesothelioma (N. G. Ordóñez) 193 FIGURE 1. A, epithelioid mesothelioma exhibiting strong mesothelin reactivity. B, higher magnification demonstrating that the strong positivity is mainly on the apical surface of the cells. lin positive. In all of these cases, the staining was Because mesothelin is strongly expressed in nor- membranous and occurred in small, focal areas mal mesothelial cells and in mesotheliomas, Chang of the tumor (5 to 10% of the neoplastic cells). et al. (13) investigated the potential use of this pro- The immunohistochemical results are summa- tein as an immunohistochemical marker for distin- rized in Table 1.