Increased cyclooxygenase-2 expression is associated with better clinical outcome in patients submitted to complete ablation for severe endometriosis

Francesco Fanfani, Anna Fagotti, Gabriella Ferrandina, Giuseppe Bifulco, Francesco Legge, Domenica Lorusso, Luca Minelli, Giovanni Scambia
Human Reproduction · 2005 · vol. 20(10) , pp. 2964–2968 · doi:10.1093/humrep/dei160 · PMID:15979990 · W2116822764
article OA: bronze CC0 ⤵ 9 in-corpus citations
📄 Open PDF View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-08 ⓘ

Increased cyclooxygenase-2 expression in severe endometriosis tissue correlates with a lower risk of relapse and longer relapse-free survival after complete laparoscopic ablation.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Recent studies have demonstrated the overexpression of cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) in endometriosis. The aim of this study was to investigate the correlation between COX-2 expression and the clinical outcome rate in a homogeneous series of patients undergoing fertility-sparing complete laparoscopic ablation for severe endometriosis. METHODS: COX-2 expression was analysed by immunohistochemistry in 103 samples, 71 endometriomas (group 1) and 32 peritoneal implants and or recto-vaginal nodules (group 2) of endometriotic tissue from 85 patients submitted to complete laparoscopic ablation of severe endometriosis. RESULTS: At median follow-up of 54 months, a recurrence rate of 24.7% (n = 21) was observed. Patients with COX-2-positive endometriotic cysts showed a lower relapse rate than COX-2-negative cases (16.7 versus 41.2%; P = 0.036). Patients with COX-2-positive peritoneal implant and or recto-vaginal nodule showed a similar trend. Taking the two groups of patients together, we found a significantly lower relapse rate in COX-2-positive patients in comparison to COX-2-negative patients (16.4 versus 40%; P = 0.0152). Moreover, COX-2-positive patients showed a longer relapse-free survival in comparison to COX-2-negative patients (P = 0.016). CONCLUSIONS: In patients with severe endometriosis who underwent fertility-sparing complete ablation, COX-2 overexpression characterizes a subgroup of patients with lower risk of relapse and longer relapse-free survival.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

Cyclooxygenase 2 Endometriosis Endometriosis Gene Expression Regulation, Enzymologic Adult Cyclooxygenase 2 Disease-Free Survival Endometriosis Endometrium Endometrium Endometrium Endometrium Female Follow-Up Studies Humans Immunohistochemistry Laparoscopy Laparoscopy Recurrence Time Factors

Citation neighborhood

Papers in the corpus that this work cites (lower rings, blue) and that cite this one (upper rings, green). Dot size scales with the paper's in-corpus citation count — bigger dot = more influential within the endo/adeno field. Click a dot to open that paper. [ expand to 2 hops ] — adds papers reached through this work's immediate citers/citees. Heavier; up to 60 extra dots.

References (26)

Cited by (9)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-06-19T06:14:56.452680+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:15:35.797702+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK