Association between clinicopathological variables and the immunohistochemical expression of Ezrin and CD44 in patients with osteosarcoma / Estudo da associação das variáveis clínico-patológicas com a expressão imunoistoquímica de Ezrin e CD44 em pacientes portadores de osteossarcoma

AUTOR(ES)
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2010

RESUMO

Metastasis is the most important prognostic factor in patients with osteosarcoma. Identification of genes that are crucial for metastatic dissemination is of great interest, not only to gain a basic understanding of the molecular and cellular processes involved, but also to provide the potential for new therapeutic targets. In relation to osteosarcoma, it has been reported that the Ezrin gene, a member of the ERM family (ezrin-radixin-moesin), is important for enabling metastasis. Ezrin is a component of the cytoskeleton that has been implicated in many functions, for example as a conductor of signals between cell surfaces associated with metastasis and signal translation. This suggests that Ezrin holds the key to coordination of the signals and cell complexes needed for successful metastasis to occur. CD44 is known as the first surface protein that was shown to interact with proteins of the ERM complex. It forms a complex that plays various roles in normal cells and particularly in cancer cells. Increased CD44 expression potentially leads to functional increases in Ezrin activation and has been correlated with greater osteosarcoma invasion. Objective: The aim of this study was to correlate the expression of the Ezrin and CD44 proteins with clinical factors and identify prognostic factors, thereby enabling stratification of patients at risk, so that therapy of greater effectiveness and lower toxicity can be proposed in the future. Sample and Methods: Data on 52 patients with osteosarcoma who were treated at Barretos Cancer Hospital between 2000 and 2005 were reviewed. Bone tumors are among the types of solid neoplasia most frequently seen in our institution, accounting for around 15% of the new cases every year. Because of certain special features such as our institutions national-level attendance, 46.2% of the patients were metastatic at diagnosis, 37.3% of the tumors were larger than 15 cm, 30.2% of the cases led to amputation and 11.5% of the conservatively operated cases presented local relapse. We did not find any association between symptoms and either tumor size or presence of metastases. The expression levels of the Ezrin and CD44H proteins were evaluated using immunohistochemistry on the initial biopsy, for 34 samples. From the immunohistochemical staining, the Ezrin protein expression level was classified as 1+ (1 - 25%), 2+ (26 - 50%), 3+ (51 - 75%) or 4+ (76 - 100%). CD44 was classified as negative (up to 10%), 1+ (up to 50%) or 2+ (up to 100%). The Ezrin expression was scored to classify it as low or high (considering the intensity and proportion of stained cells) and the interaction of Ezrin expression with the degree of responsiveness to chemotherapy. The chi-square test was used to correlate the variables. Estimators for survival likelihood were calculated using the Kaplan-Meier technique and the curves were compared using the log-rank test. Results: Most patients with osteosarcoma (76%) were immunoreactive for Ezrin protein, equally distributed between cytoplasm and membrane (38.2%). High-intensity staining was found in 58.9%. On the semiquantitative scale, half of the cases presented more than 50% of the cells stained. From the score correlating staining intensity and proportion of cells stained, 50.0% showed high expression. Half of the patients were positive for CD44H, predominantly in cytoplasm (38.2%). On the semiquantitative scale, 20.6% presented staining in more than 50% of the cells. Neither of the markers showed associations with any of the clinicopathological variables studied. Among the patients who were immunoreactive for Ezrin, the five-year survival rate was 12.8%, while it was 41.7% among Ezrinnegative patients (p = 0.121). The score relating to Ezrin immunoreactivity was not shown to have a role in survival (p = 0.558). However, the interaction between Ezrinpositive findings and poor histological response among non-metastatic patients showed an association with five-year relapse-free survival (100% x 12.7%; p = 0.042). The overall survival rates for CD44-positive and negative patients were similar (21.5% and 25.3%, respectively) (p = 0.676). Conclusion: In our experience, neither CD44H nor Ezrin immunoexpression predicted the prognosis for patients with osteosarcoma. The results suggest that further investigations are needed in order to better define the relationships between Ezrin and CD44 expression patterns, functional status and survival among patients with osteosarcoma.

ASSUNTO(S)

prognostic prognóstico imunoistochemistry metastasis osteosarcoma imunoistoquímica metástase neoplásica osteossarcoma

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