Table 2.
Mesothelin expression in thymic epithelial tumors (n=71)
| Histology | Number of samples | Positive N (%) | Percentage of mesothelin
positive cells |
Negative N (%) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| < 1% | 1–50% | 51–100% | ||||
|
| ||||||
| Thymic carcinoma | 34 | 27 (79) | 0 | 8 | 19* | 7 (21) |
| Squamous | 30 | 25 (83) | 0 | 8 | 17 | 5 (17) |
| Basaloid | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 (100) |
| Uncategorized | 3 | 2 (67) | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 (33) |
|
| ||||||
| Thymoma | 29 | 3 (10) | 1 | 1 | 1 | 26 (90) |
|
| ||||||
| Thymic neuroendocrine tumors^ | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 8 (100) |
*
Mesothelin expression was detected in 60% of tumor cells in 2 (SCC and uncategorized), 70% in 1 (SCC), 80% in 2 (both SCC), 95% in 1 (SCC) and 100% in 13 cases (12 SCC, 1 uncategorized) respectively.
^
Thymic neuroendocrine tumors consisted of 2 cases of atypical carcinoid and 6 cases of large cell neuroendocrine carcinoma.