Risk factors for postoperative seromas in Chinese breast cancer patients / 中华医学杂志(英文版)

<p><b>BACKGROUND</b>Seroma formation is one of the most common complications after breast cancer surgery. Various risk factors have been evaluated for their associations with the development of seromas in Western populations. However, similar data are not available in Chinese series. Therefore, we sought to investigate the potential risk factors for Chinese breast cancer patients.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>A prospective study of female breast cancer patients undergoing surgery was carried out in Cancer Hospital of Fudan University, Shanghai, China. Univariate analyses were performed by chi-square test or Student's t test or Mann-Whitney test and multivariate analyses by stepwise Logistic regression. The logistic model included age (years), total serum protein concentration (g/L), drainage volume on postoperative day 3 (POD 3; ml) and time to daily drainage volume not more than 30 ml (TTV30; days).</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>A total of 158 patients with breast cancer were studied. The mean age at diagnosis was (52.14 ± 10.77) years (range 25 - 92). During the follow-up period, 24 (15.2%) patients developed seromas. Calculated as continuous variables in the stepwise Logistic regression, age (OR = 1.090, 95%CI 1.028 - 1.155, P = 0.004), total serum protein concentration (OR = 0.886, 95%CI 0.791 - 0.992, P = 0.036), drainage volume on POD3 (OR = 1.013, 95%CI 1.002 - 1.023, P = 0.017) and TTV30 (OR = 1.273, 95%CI 1.039 - 1.561, P = 0.020) were independent risk factors for seroma formation. Additionally, significant difference in daily drainage volume was substantiated in the analysis by seroma formation (P = 0.034) rather than by type of surgery (P = 0.713).</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>Although the pathogenesis of seroma remains controversial, such risk factors as age, nutritional status, drainage volume on POD3 and TTV30 should be considered for prediction and prevention of seroma formation in Chinese breast cancer patients.</p>

Expression of ER alpha in chemically induced MDA-MB-435 cells and its responsiveness to endocrine / 中华肿瘤杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the expression of ER alpha in chemically induced, ER alpha-negative human breast cancer MDA-MB-435 cells and its restoration of the responsiveness to endocrine therapy.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>MDA-MB-435 cells were treated with HDAC inhibitor trichostatin A(TSA)and DNMT1 inhibitor 5-AZA-CdR (AZA). The mRNA level of ER alpha, PR and PS2 in treated MDA-MB-435 cells was detected by RT-PCR. The WST-8 (water-soluble tetrazolium salt-8) method was used to analyze the proliferation rate of the cells. Xenograft in female nude mice was used to further explore the change of proliferation rate of treated MDA-MB-435 cells in vivo.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>After treatment with AZA and TSA, mRNA expression of ER alpha, PR and pS2 was up-regulated in MDA-MB-435 cells. The mRNA level of ER alpha was the hightest when MDA-MB-435 cells were treated with 2.5 micromol/L AZA and 100 ng/ml TSA. The treated MDA-MB-435 cells showed different proliferation rate in various media containing different concentration of estrodial. The MDA-MB-435 cells showed down-regulated proliferation rate after treatment with the combination of 2.5 micromol/L AZA and 100 ng/ml TSA, and 4-OH tamoxifen could suppress the growth rate of the induced MD-MBA-435 cells but not the untreated cells. The treated MDA-MB-435 cells showed slower proliferation rate than that of untreated cells in vivo (P <0. 01), and the proliferation rate of the treated MDA-MB-435 cells became lower when the nude mice were deprived of estrogen by castration (P <0. 01).</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>After treatment with TSA and AZA, ER alpha-negative MDA-MB-435 cells can express functional ER alpha and regain responsiveness to estrogen both in vitro and in vivo. HDAC inhibitor and DNMT1 inhibitor may play an important role in restoration of sensitivity of ER alpha-negative breast cancers to endocrine therapy.</p>