A total of 171 gastric
carcinomas comprising 69 advanced
cancers and 102 early
cancers were examined immunohistochemically for
lysozyme. Tumour cells containing
lysozyme were detected in 65 cases or 38% of the 171
gastric cancer cases. The incidence of these cells did not differ remarkably by histological type and infiltrative growth of gastric
carcinoma. Of the foregoing 65 cases, two well-differentiated
adenocarcinomas and three signet ring cell
carcinomas had numerous
lysozyme-containing tumour cells, 13 had many argentaffin or argyrophil cells, and 40 had various amounts of several types of
mucin. In addition, tumour cells containing both
lysozyme and
mucin could be identified. No correlation could be observed between
lysozyme immunoreactivity in the tumour cells and cellular infiltration of granulocytes or macrophages around the tumour. The
lysozyme appeared to be produced by tumour cells. The two year survival rates indicate a tendency for advanced
gastric cancers containing
lysozyme to have a poor prognosis.