40P - Vascular endothelial growth factor in colorectal cancer pathology, survival and treatment

Angiogenesis (the growth of new blood vessels) is important for tumour invasion and metastasis in order for a tumour to grow beyond a few millimetres in size. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is thought to be the predominant angiogenic factor in colorectal and other cancers. As a result, numerous studies have looked at VEGF expression in colorectal cancer patients and several therapeutic agents have been trialled that target the VEGF pathway. VEGF levels were determined in 100 paired tumour and normal colorectal tissue samples (1998-2001) and 75 pre-operative plasma samples (2000-2002) by ELISA. Tissue (pg/mg protein) and plasma VEGF levels (pg/ml) were correlated with the tumour pathology. Survival analysis was performed for disease-free and overall 15-year survival (Kaplan Meier, p