Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor-D (VEGF-D) is Elevated in Bronchoalveolar Lavage Fluid of Patients with Lung Squamous Carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: Previous studies have found that vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is associated with lung cancer, yet little is known about vascular endothelial growth factor-D (VEGF-D) in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) of lung cancer patients. In this study, we aim to investigate the expression and evaluation of VEGF-D in BALF for lung cancer diagnosis.

METHODS: BALF samples were acquired from 81 patients: 40 with benign diseases and 41 with lung cancer. The expression of VEGF-D in BALF was measured using sandwich enzyme-linked immune sorbent assays (ELISA), and the evaluation of VEGF-D in BALF for lung cancer diagnosis was also investigated.

RESULTS: In the BALF samples, the levels of VEGF-D in the lung cancer group were higher than in the benign disease group; however, there was no statistical significance between the two groups (p > 0.05). In the pathological classification of lung cancer, the levels of VEGF-D in the BALF differed significantly between the lung squamous carcinoma group and the benign disease group (p < 0.05). The diagnostic accuracies of VEGF-D in BALF for discrimination between patients with squamous cell carcinoma and benign disease were reasonable based on receiver operating characteristic (ROC curve) analysis, with a corresponding sensitivity of 64.7% and specificity of 60%, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated that the detection of VEGF-D levels in BALF is a valuable diagnostic tool for lung squamous carcinoma.