Expression of calcitonin gene-related peptide-receptor component protein in hepatocellular carcinoma and its association with prognosis / 临床肝胆病杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the expression level of calcitonin gene-related peptide-receptor component protein (CRCP) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) tissue and adjacent tissue and its association with the clinicopathological features and prognosis of patients. Methods HCC and adjacent tissue samples were collected from 79 HCC patients who underwent surgical resection in Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Navy Medical University, from June 2003 to September 2009. Tissue microarray was prepared, and immunohistochemistry was used for quantitative analysis. Related proteins were extracted and measured by Western blot, and the expression of CRCP was compared between HCC tissue and adjacent tissue. The chi-square test was used for comparison of categorical data between groups. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was performed to obtain the area under the ROC curve (AUC), and goodness of fit was evaluated. Youden index was used to determine the optimal cut-off value. and the Kaplan-Meier survival analysis was used to analyze the association of CRCP expression with the recurrence and prognosis of HCC, and the log rank test was used for comparison between the two groups. Results Among the 79 HCC patients, there were 67 male patients and 12 female patients, with an age of 10-72 years, and 20 patients had portal vein tumor thrombus. As for pathological grade, 1 had grade 4 HCC, 61 had grade 3 HCC, and 17 had grade 2 HCC; as for BCLC stage, 5 had BCLC stage 0 HCC, 55 had BCLC stage A HCC, 11 had BCLC stage B HCC, and 8 had BCLC stage C HCC. Western blot showed that the expression level of CRCP in HCC tissue was lower than that in adjacent tissue in 4 patients, and immunohistochemistry showed that the expression level of CRCP in HCC tissue was significantly lower than that in adjacent tissue in 75.9% of the patients. Low CRCP expression was associated with CK19 positivity, incomplete tumor capsule, presence of portal vein tumor thrombus, and high pathological grade ( χ 2 =6.410, 4.829, 9.319, and 9.083, all P < 0.05). Compared with the low CRCP expression group, the high CRCP expression group had a significantly longer overall survival time and a significantly lower recurrence rate ( P < 0.001 and P =0.009). Conclusion Patients with low CRCP expression in HCC tissue tend to have a poorer prognosis than those with high CRCP expression, and CRCP may participate in the development, progression, and metastasis of HCC, suggesting that this molecule can be used as a potential biomarker to predict the prognosis of HCC patients.