Host immunosurveillance contributes to the control of erbB-2 overexpression in HLA-A2-breast-cancer patients
✍ Scribed by Paola Nisticò; Marcella Mottolese; Simona Cascioli; Maria Benevolo; Duilia Del Bello; Francesca Di Modugno; Oriana Rubiu; Francesco Paolo Gentile; Claudio Botti; Irene Venturo; Pier Giorgio Natali
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1999
- Tongue
- French
- Weight
- 324 KB
- Volume
- 84
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0020-7136
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✦ Synopsis
Overexpression of gp185 erbB-2 has been associated with reduced survival in breast-cancer patients. Our earlier results, now confirmed in a larger cohort of patients ( ), evidenced that the HLA-A2 allele may participate in the modulation of the erbB-2 tumor phenotype in vivo. In the present study, we evaluated other clinico-biopathologic parameters possibly involved in the host immune response against erbB-2. Localization of the CD3 ؉ T-cell infiltrate was taken into consideration in 705 primary breast tumors, and expression of HLA-class-I and HLA-A2 antigens was evaluated in a subgroup of 170 frozen primary tumors of HLA-A2positive patients. The presence or the absence of HLA-class-I and HLA-A2 antigens in primary tumors did not correlate with erbB-2 expression. However, HLA-A2-positive tumors preferentially showed intratumoral lymphocyte localization, whereas the lesions displaying undetectable HLA-class-I expression showed peritumoral CD3 ؉ T-cell localization. Taking into account erbB-2 immunoreactivity, we found that the relationship between HLA-A2 expression and intratumoral CD3 ؉ T-lymphocyte localization is significant only in the erbB-2 negative subset, whereas the relationship between lack of HLA-class-I expression and peritumoral CD3 ؉ T-lymphocyte localization is significant only in the erbB-2positive subset. These data provide novel in vivo evidence of the possible contribution of the host immune system to control of erbB-2 oncogene overexpression in breast cancer.