Expression of Survivin and MMP-9 in Eutopic Endometrium of Patients with Endometriosis

Objective: To investigate the expression of survivin and MMP-9 in the eutopic endometrium of patients with endometriosis (EMs). Methods: Eighty patients with endometriosis were selected as EMs group, four of them were in clinical stageⅠ, 25 in stageⅡ, 44 in stage Ⅲ and 7 in stage Ⅳ, 47 in the proliferative phase and 33 in the secretory phase of the menstrual cycles. Twenty patients with hysteromyoma were selected as control group, including 7 patients in the proliferative phase and 13 in the secretory phase of the menstrual cycles. The expression levels of survivin and MMP-9 were determined by immuno-histochemical method. Image-Pro Plus 6.0 (IPP), the special-purpose system for quantitative measurement of medical images, was used to analyse the results quantitatively. Results: Both survivin and MMP-9 were found positive in the plasma of the endometriosis. Both survivin and MMP-9 expression levels were higher in EMs group than those in the control group (P 0.01). Besides, survivin was over expressed with no relation to the menstrual cycle of the endometium. Survivin expression was higher in endometriosis stage Ⅱ than that of the stage Ⅲ(P 0.05). There was no difference in survivin expression within other stages(P 0.05). While MMP-9 expression had no difference between all the endometriosis stages(P 0.05). There was a close relationship between survivin and MMP-9 expression levels in 80 eutopic endometrium of endometriosis(r = 0.262, t = 2.860, P 0.05). Conclusion: The over expression of survivin and MMP-9 may play an important role in the pathogenesis of en- dometriosis.