Prognostic significance of serum p53 antibodies in patients with limited-stage small cell lung cancer

✍ Scribed by Gérard Zalcman; Jean Trédaniel; Beata Schlichtholz; Thierry Urban; Bernard Milleron; Richard Lubin; Véronique Meignin; Louis-Jean Couderc; Albert Hirsch; Thierry Soussi

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2000
• Tongue: French
• Weight: 239 KB
• Volume: 89
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0020-7136
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1097-0215(20000120)89:1<81::aid-ijc13>3.0.co;2-i

✦ Synopsis

p53 tumour suppressor gene alterations are one of the most frequent genetic events in lung cancer. A subset of patients with p53 mutation and cancer exhibited circulating serum anti-p53 self-antibodies (p53-Ab). The prevalence of these antibodies in lung cancer is currently being analysed in a multicentric study. In a group of homogeneous SCLC patients, p53-Ab were detected in 20/97 (20.6%) individuals. In this group of patients, Cox's multivariate analysis identified disease extent (p ‫؍‬ 0.022), WHO initial performance status greater than 0 (p ‫؍‬ 0.005), and the absence of a complete response after 6 months of treatment (p < 0.0001) as independent prognostic variables, with p53-Ab being of borderline significance (p ‫؍‬ 0.051). In the subset of limited-stage SCLC patients, Cox's multivariate analysis found p53-Ab (p ‫؍‬ 0.033), WHO initial performance status greater than 0 (p ‫؍‬ 0.028), and absence of a complete response (p < 0.001) to be independent prognostic variables. Thus, actuarial analysis showed that patients with limited-stage SCLC and p53-Ab had a median survival time of 10 months, whereas limitedstage SCLC patients without p53-Ab had a 17-month median survival time (p ‫؍‬ 0.014).Therefore, serum assay of p53-Ab could help to identify a population of SCLC patients with an especially poor prognosis. This population could represent patients with tumours harboring aggressive p53 mutations.