Loss of TRAIL-receptors is a recurrent feature in pancreatic cancer and determines the prognosis of patients with no nodal metastasis after surgery

Gallmeier, Eike; Bader, Dominik C.; Kriegl, Lydia; Berezowska, Sabina Anna; Seeliger, Hendrik; Göke, Burkhard; Kirchner, Thomas; Bruns, Christiane; De Toni, Enrico N. (2013). Loss of TRAIL-receptors is a recurrent feature in pancreatic cancer and determines the prognosis of patients with no nodal metastasis after surgery. PLoS ONE, 8(2), e56760. Public Library of Science 10.1371/journal.pone.0056760

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INTRODUCTION

Agonistic antibodies targeting TRAIL-receptors 1 and 2 (TRAIL-R1 and TRAIL-R2) are being developed as a novel therapeutic approach in cancer therapy including pancreatic cancer. However, the cellular distribution of these receptors in primary pancreatic cancer samples has not been sufficiently investigated and no study has yet addressed the issue of their prognostic significance in this tumor entity.

AIMS AND METHODS

Applying tissue microarray (TMA) analysis, we performed an immunohistochemical assessment of TRAIL-receptors in surgical samples from 84 consecutive patients affected by pancreatic adenocarcinoma and in 26 additional selected specimens from patients with no lymph nodes metastasis at the time of surgery. The prognostic significance of membrane staining and staining intensity for TRAIL-receptors was evaluated.

RESULTS

The fraction of pancreatic cancer samples with positive membrane staining for TRAIL-R1 and TRAIL-R2 was lower than that of cells from surrounding non-tumor tissues (TRAIL-R1: p<0.001, TRAIL-R2: p = 0.006). In addition, subgroup analyses showed that loss of membrane staining for TRAIL-R2 was associated with poorer prognosis in patients without nodal metastases (multivariate Cox regression analysis, Hazard Ratio: 0.44 [95% confidence interval: 0.22-0.87]; p = 0.019). In contrast, analysis of decoy receptors TRAIL-R3 and -R4 in tumor samples showed an exclusively cytoplasmatic staining pattern and no prognostic relevance.

CONCLUSION

This is a first report on the prognostic significance of TRAIL-receptors expression in pancreatic cancer showing that TRAIL-R2 might represent a prognostic marker for patients with early stage disease. In addition, our data suggest that loss of membrane-bound TRAIL-receptors could represent a molecular mechanism for therapeutic failure upon administration of TRAIL-receptors-targeting antibodies in pancreatic cancer. This hypothesis should be evaluated in future clinical trials.

Item Type:

Journal Article (Original Article)

Division/Institute:

04 Faculty of Medicine > Service Sector > Institute of Pathology

UniBE Contributor:

Berezowska, Sabina Anna

Subjects:

500 Science > 570 Life sciences; biology
600 Technology > 610 Medicine & health

ISSN:

1932-6203

Publisher:

Public Library of Science

Language:

English

Submitter:

Andrea Arnold

Date Deposited:

07 Apr 2014 08:44

Last Modified:

05 Dec 2022 14:30

Publisher DOI:

10.1371/journal.pone.0056760

PubMed ID:

23460812

BORIS DOI:

10.7892/boris.45887

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/45887

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