In contrast to the present observation, an association between Survivin expression and reduced apoptotic indices has been reported in another series of pancreatic cancer (Satoh et al, 2001) and also for colorectal (Kawasaki et al, 1998), gastric (Lu et al, 1998), and breast cancer (Tanaka et al, 2000). The gene discussed is BIRC5; the disease is familial pancreatic carcinoma.