Evaluation of the relationship between clinicopathological and immunohistochemical risk factors for liver metastasis, including CD10 expression, is meaningful in colorectal carcinoma (CRC). The purpose of the present study was to clarify what kind of risk factors are significant and independent factors for the development of liver metastasis in CRC. Sixty cases of advanced CRC with synchronous liver metastasis and sixty cases of advanced CRC without liver metastasis at least 5 years after resection of the primary CRC were randomly selected. We analysed the clinicopathological factors and the expression of four biological factors, CD44, transforming growth factor alpha (TGF-α), vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and CD10, by immunohistochemistry. Univariate analysis revealed that the incidence of vascular invasion, the incidence of lymph node metastasis and the expression of CD44, TGF-α, VEGF and CD10 were all significantly higher in the cases of CRC with liver metastasis than in cases of non-metastatic CRC. Logistic regression analysis showed that lymph node metastasis, the expression of CD10 and the expression of VEGF were significant factors and independent of the other variables. If all three markers are positive, the probability of liver metastasis becomes 92.7%. In this study, lymph node metastasis, CD10 and VEGF were all found to be significant risk factors for the development of liver metastasis in the cases of CRC. These risk factors according to multivariate analysis are candidate markers for predicting the development of liver metastasis.

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