Immunohistochemical expression of endometrial L-selectin ligand is higher in donor egg recipients with embryonic implantation.
Academic Article
Overview
abstract
OBJECTIVE: To correlate L-selectin ligand (LSL) expression in human endometrium with embryonic implantation. DESIGN: Retrospective cohort analysis. SETTING: University-based fertility center. PATIENT(S): Donor egg recipients (DERs) who underwent programmed hormonal replacement for ET with prior mock cycle luteal phase endometrial biopsy. INTERVENTION(S): Immunohistochemical expression of LSL using MECA-79 antibody was examined. Slides were scored with a new scoring system, the IHC-Level (range 0-4) as follows: strength of staining-absent (0), weak (1), or strong (2); plus distribution of staining-absent (0), <50% of tissue (1), and >50% (2). Cellular apex and cytoplasm were scored independently in both the endometrial glandular and surface epithelium. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): Endometrial LSL expression in pregnant versus nonpregnant patients. RESULT(S): MECA-79 IHC-Level of the apex of surface epithelium was significantly higher for pregnant versus nonpregnant DERs (3.8 vs. 3.4). When controlling for embryo morphology, there continues to be a significant difference in apex score on surface epithelium (3.8 vs. 3.3, respectively). The new scoring system results correlated with an established scoring system, the HSCORE. CONCLUSION(S): We demonstrate significantly higher expression of LSL at the apex of human endometrial surface epithelium obtained from DERs with embryonic implantation. Furthermore, we present the IHC-Level, a method of evaluating immunohistochemistry that may be applied to other markers of endometrial receptivity.
