© 2017 OAE Publishing Inc. www.oaepublish.com 29 Stem cell markers as a resource to predict prognosis of betel quid induced oral squamous cell carcinoma: an immunohistochemical investigation Primali Jayasooriya, Champika Fernando, Anura Suraweera, Upul Dissanayake Department of Oral Pathology, Faculty of Dental Sciences, University of Peradeniya, Peradeniya 20400, Sri Lanka. Correspondence to: Dr. Primali Jayasooriya, Department of Oral Pathology, Faculty of Dental Sciences, University of Peradeniya, Peradeniya 20400, Sri Lanka. E-mail: primalij@yahoo.com How to cite this article: Jayasooriya P, Fernando C, Suraweera A, Dissanayake U. Stem cell markers as a resource to predict prognosis of betel quid induced oral squamous cell carcinoma: an immunohistochemical investigation. Stomatological Dis Sci 2017;1:29-34. Quick Response Code: Original Article This is an open access article licensed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, as long as the original author is credited and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms. For reprints contact: service@oaepublish.com Open Access Jayasooriya et al. Stomatological Dis Sci 2017;1:29-34 DOI: 10.20517/2573-0002.2016.11 Stomatological Disease and Science www.sdsjournal.com Aim: The study was to correlate the survival of a group of Sri Lankan betel quid induced oral cancer patients with the expression patterns of fve cancer stem cell (CSC) markers namely ALDH1, Sox-2, Bmi-1, C-met, and Oct-4. Methods: Archival tissues of 140 oral squamous cell carcinomas (OSCCs) were stained with CSC markers, ALDH1, Sox-2, Bmi-1, C-met, and Oct-4. Survival analysis was performed with SPSS version 20, using Kaplan-Meier survival curves and signifcance with chi-square test and Breslow’s (generalized Wilcoxon) test. Results: Immunohistochemical investigations revealed 55.7%, 58.6%, 40%, 34.6%, and 31.4% of OSCCs showing ALDH1, Sox-2, Bmi-1, C-met and Oct-4 expression respectively. ALDH1 positivity was signifcantly associated with nodal metastasis (X 2 = 4.6; P = 0.03). Although it did not reach statistical signifcance, ALDH1 expression was also correlated with poor survival (P = 0.06). No statistically signifcant fndings could be observed when the expression of other CSC markers were correlated with nodal metastasis and survival (P > 0.05). Conclusion: Out of the fve CSC markers investigated, only ALDH1 showed promise as a potential marker to predict nodal metastasis and survival in the present study sample of OSCC patients. Key words: Cancer stem cell markers, oral squamous cell carcinoma, immunohistochemistry ABSTRACT Article history: Received: 15-12-2016 Accepted: 03-03-2017 Published: 31-03-2017 Prof. Primali Jayasooriya joined the Department of Oral Pathology, Faculty of Dental Sciences, University of Peradeniya as a Lecturer in 1995. She received her Bachelor of Dental Science degree from University of Peradeniya in 1994, her PhD from Tokyo Medical and Dental University in 2002 and her MD from the University of Colombo in 2013. Her primary research interest is in identifying molecular markers of oral squamous cell carcinoma. She has approximately 35 publications in both local and international journals to her credit. She has also authored two books that deal with the subject of Oral Pathology for dental graduates and two books for the public on adverse effects of smoking and introduction to oral health.