Background: Kaposi's sarcoma is a multicentric, low-grade, vascular neoplasia. Human herpesvirus 8 is associated with all epidemiological forms of KS and has been shown in vitro to induce the tyrosine receptor kinase c-Kit in infected cells.
Aim: To investigate the expression of c-Kit in cases of classic KS and to clarify its association with clinicopathological parameters and HHV8 latency-associated nuclear antigen-1 expression.
Methods: In total, 35 cases of classic KS at various histological stages were included in the study. Age and gender of the patients and location and histological stage of the tumours were recorded. Formalin-fixed, paraffin wax-embedded tissue sections were stained by immunohistochemistry with antibodies to c-Kit and HHV8.
Results: c-Kit immunoreactivity was found in 22 cases and HHV8 immunoreactivity was present in all cases. There was no correlation in c-Kit immunoreactivity between clinicopathological parameters and HHV8 immunoreactivity.
Conclusions: The results of our study show that in cases of classic KS there is a high rate of c-Kit immunoreactivity, but c-Kit expression does not show any correlation with HHV8 immunoreactivity.