BACKGROUNDThe activation of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) downstream molecule Akt plays an important role in lung carcinogenesis and tumor progression. The aim of this study is to evaluate the association of phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) expression with EGFR expression and survival in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients.

METHODSp-Akt and EGFR expressions were detected by immunohistochemistry in 167 NSCLC samples constructed into tissue microarray.

RESULTSp-Akt protein positively expressed in 52.1% (87/167) samples. There were no statistically significant association between p-Akt protein expression and gender, age, smoking status, histology, differentiation or pathological stage (P > 0.05). Spearman correlation anylasis failed to show association of positive p-Akt with EGFR protein expression (P=0.122). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis showed both of the positive p-Akt expression and p-Akt/EGFR co-expression had no impact on the patients' survival (P=0.903 and P=0.894 respectively). Cox regression anylasis indicated that survival time correlated with tumor differentiation and pathological stage (P=0.034 and P=0.003 respectively).

CONCLUSIONSIn NSCLC patients, positive p-Akt expression does not correlate with any clinicopathological features and has no impact on survival.