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Imaging, Diagnosis, Prognosis |
Authors' Affiliations: Department of 1 Surgery and Clinical Oncology, 2 Pathology, and 3 Molecular Medicine, Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, Suita, Osaka, and 4 Division of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, Hyogo College of Medicine, Nishinomiya, Hyogo, Japan
Requests for reprints: Shinji Yamamoto, Department of Surgery and Clinical Oncology, Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, 2-2 Yamadaoka, Suita, Osaka 565-0871, Japan. Phone: 81-6-6879-3251; Fax: 81-6-6879-3259; E-mail: shinjiyamamoto2005{at}yahoo.co.jp.
| Abstract |
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Patients and Methods: HDGF expression in 317 patients with gastric carcinoma (233 males and 84 females) with ages ranging from 26 to 81 years (median, 60 years) was analyzed by immunohistochemistry. Samples with >90% of tumor cells to express positive immunoreactivity similar to or stronger than that in endothelial cells both for nucleus and cytoplasm were regarded as HDGF index level 2, and others as HDGF index level 1.
Results: One hundred and eighty-two cases showed level 1 HDGF expression, whereas 135 cases showed level 2 HDGF expression. Patients with level 2 expression showed higher rates of proximal tumor location (P < 0.0001), large tumor size (P < 0.0001), infiltrative tumor growth (P < 0.0001), presence of vascular and lymphatic invasion (P < 0.0001 for both), presence of lymph node metastasis (P < 0.0001), deep tumor invasion (P < 0.0001), and poorer disease-free and overall survival (P < 0.0001 for both) compared to those with level 1 expression. Multivariate analysis revealed HDGF expression level as an independent prognosticator for disease-free and overall survival.
Conclusion: HDGF expression level was shown to be a prognostic factor for gastric carcinoma.
40 per 100,000 population and its mortality is ranked second as a cause of cancer death in Japan (2) in spite of the recent advances in diagnostic techniques for early detection of the disease, and in spite of the progress in surgical procedures. To date, a number of clinicopathologic characteristics such as depth of tumor invasion and lymph node metastasis have been identified to be prognosticators for recurrence and survival of patients with gastric carcinoma (3). The tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) staging system, which is composed of tumor invasion, lymph node metastasis, and distant metastasis, is regarded as the most important in predicting tumor recurrence and prognosis after potentially curative resection of gastric carcinoma (4). Although the prognoses for patients, even those with advanced disease (stages II and III), is heterogeneous, therefore, a strategy to establish appropriate therapeutic modalities for each patient is not formulated as yet.
Hepatoma-derived growth factor (HDGF) was one of the heparin-binding growth factors. It was originally purified from the conditioned medium of human hepatocellular carcinoma cell line HuH-7 that proliferates autonomously in a serum-free chemically defined medium (5, 6). HDGF is also highly expressed in several fetal tissues and may be involved in the development of organs such as lung, muscle, vessels, kidney, and liver (711). HDGF has a mitogenic function for various cells such as human hepatocellular carcinoma cells, fibroblasts, endothelial cells, vascular smooth muscle cells, and fetal hepatocytes (8, 9, 1113). HDGF translocates to the nucleus and its nuclear targeting stimulates cell growth (8, 14). Following these reports, our hypothesis was that HDGF expression in human malignant tumors might also have an important functional role in the formation of metastasis and might consequently influence the prognosis of patients. In fact, there have been several reports showing the correlation of increased HDGF expression and poor prognosis in cancers (1517). However, there have been no reports evaluating the correlation of HDGF expression with clinicopathologic features and prognosis in gastric carcinomas.
In the present study, the expression levels of HDGF in 317 patients with gastric carcinoma undergoing surgery, and the relation between the HDGF expression and clinicopathologic features and prognosis were analyzed.
| Patients and Methods |
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After surgery, all patients received laboratory examination such as routine peripheral blood cell counts and serum carcinoembryonic antigen level at 1- to 6-month intervals, chest roentgenogram, ultrasonography of liver, computerized tomographic scan of abdomen, and endoscopic examination of the rest stomach at 6- to 12-month intervals. Adjuvant chemotherapy was done in 48 patients (preoperative in 9, during operation in 1, postoperative in 28, both pre- and postoperative in 5, and both during operation and postoperative period in 5) with high risk for tumor recurrence, i.e., presence of lymph node metastasis, huge size (diameter >10 cm) of the tumor, and tumor invasion to the serosa. Chemotherapeutic protocols were as follows: fluorouracil (5-FU) or its derivative alone in 7 patients; cisplatinum (CDDP) or its derivative alone in 4 patients; 5-FU and CDDP in 15 patients; 5-FU and mitomycin C (MMC) in 1 patient; CDDP and MMC in 1 patient; 5-FU, CDDP, and MMC in 2 patients; 5-FU, CDDP, and doxorubicin or its analogues in 2 patients; 5-FU, CDDP, and methotrexate in 4 patients; 5-FU, CDDP, doxorubicin, and MMC in 5 patients; 5-FU, CDDP, methotrexate, and epirubicin in 4 patients; 5-FU, CDDP, MMC, and epirubicin in 1 patient; and 5-FU, CDDP, doxorubicin, MMC, and epirubicin in 2 patients. Follow-up period for survivors ranged from 1 to 96 months (median, 52.0 months).
Immunohistochemical assays. Immunohistochemical studies were done by the avidin-biotin-peroxidase complex method. Antigen retrieval was done with heating the sections in 10 mmol/L citrate buffer for 5 minutes. In the primary antibody reaction step, the slides were incubated with the rabbit polyclonal antibody against COOH-terminal amino acids (amino acids 231-240) of the human HDGF sequence was used as the primary antibody at a dilution of 1:5,000. This specific anti-HDGF antibody was purified by COOH-terminal peptide-conjugated Sepharose column (11, 19). Nonimmunized rabbit IgG (Vector Labs, Burlingame, CA) was used as a substitute for the primary antibody to verify the possibility of false-positive responses from nonspecific binding of IgG or from the secondary antibody. Counterstaining was done with methyl green.
Specimen classification based on immunohistochemical results. All immunohistochemically stained sections were examined in a blinded manner without any knowledge of the clinicopathologic variables and patients' outcome. Staining in endothelial cells in the noncancerous areas in each specimen was used as an internal positive control. Constant HDGF expression in the endothelial cells has been reported (10). The HDGF expression pattern was independently evaluated for the nucleus and cytoplasm; cells showing staining intensity similar to or stronger than that in endothelial cells in the nucleus or cytoplasm were regarded as nucleus-positive or cytoplasm-positive, respectively. Samples with >90% of tumor cells to express positive immunoreactivity both for nucleus and cytoplasm were regarded as HDGF index level 2, and others as HDGF index level 1.
Statistical analysis. SAS software (Statistical Analysis System Institute, Cary, NC) was used for all statistical analyses. The
2 test and Fisher's exact probability test were used to examine the relationship between HDGF expression and clinicopathologic variables of prognosis. The cumulative survival rate was calculated by the Kaplan-Meier method and statistical significance was examined by the log-rank test (20). Multivariate analysis of factors related to survival were analyzed by the Cox's proportional hazards regression model (21). Statistical significance was identified as P < 0.05.
| Results |
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Patients' outcome. Five-year disease-free and overall survival rate was 76.3% and 77.3%, respectively. Sixty-five patients died due to tumors and 72 showed tumor recurrence in the peritoneum in 37, lymph node in 24, liver in 12, and other organs in 5. Tumor recurrence in 12 patients was determined at the time of the patients' death. In the remaining 53 patients, tumor recurrence was detected from 12 days to 4 years (median, 133 days) before the patients' death.
Expression of HDGF in gastric carcinoma. HDGF expression was observed mainly in the nucleus in nonneoplastic gastric mucosa, where negative to faint immunostaining in the cytoplasm was observed. On the contrary, the staining pattern in the gastric carcinoma was diverse. One hundred and ninety-four cases (61.2%) showed strong staining in the nucleus of tumor cells in >90% of tumor cells, and were thus regarded as nucleus-positive, 188 cases (59.3%) with strong cytoplasmic staining in >90% of tumor cells were cytoplasm-positive. Among them, 138 cases (43.5%) indicating both nucleus- and cytoplasm-positivity, were regarded as HDGF index level 2. The remaining 179 cases (56.5%) were regarded as HDGF index level 1 (Fig. 1).
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| Discussion |
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Proximally located gastric carcinomas showed the highest rate of HDGF level 2 and deep tumor invasion. However, there was no significant difference as for the rate of HDGF level 2 among the groups according to tumor location when cases of the same depth (pT) were compared. Increased frequency of HDGF level 2 cases in proximally located gastric carcinomas might be due to the higher frequencies of advanced tumor in this group.
Adjuvant chemotherapy was done for patients with a high risk for tumor recurrence, i.e., deep tumor invasion or metastasis to the lymph nodes and other organs. Gastric carcinomas obtained from patients receiving chemotherapy showed a higher rate of HDGF level 2 compared with those treated with surgery alone, however, there was no significant difference as for the rate of HDGF level 2 between patients receiving preoperative chemotherapy and postoperative chemotherapy. Therefore, the effect of chemotherapy on HDGF expression in the tumors could not be shown in the present study.
The present univariate and multivariate analyses revealed the HDGF expression level to be an independent prognosticator for gastric carcinoma recurrence and patients' survival. Analysis of HDGF index, together with other independent prognosticators such as tumor size, pattern of tumor growth, lymph node metastasis, and depth of tumor invasion, might be a useful tool in predicting prognosis and in the decision-making for choosing the appropriate therapeutic modalities for patients with gastric carcinoma.
In conclusion, HDGF expression, as determined by immunohistochemistry, could be used as a new prognosticator for gastric carcinoma. Although further study is still needed to determine the precise role of HDGF in the malignant behavior of gastric carcinoma, the results of the present study imply that HDGF might be a potential target for anticancer drug design.
| Footnotes |
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Received 6/21/05; revised 9/ 5/05; accepted 10/26/05.
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