Clinicopathological and prognostic significance of expression of forkhead box P1 in patients with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma / 中华肝胆外科杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To study the expression of forkhead box P1 (FOXP1) in intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC), and its clinicopathological and prognostic significance.Methods:The clinical data of ICC patients treated with radical resection at Xinhua Hospital Affiliated to Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine from January 1, 2013 to December 12, 2019 were retrospectively analysed. Of 48 ICC patients, there were 24 males and 24 females, with age of (59.1±10.1) years old (range 42 to 83 years old). Their clinicopathological data, including age, gender, tumor size, degree of differentiation, and staging were recorded. Immunohistochemical method was used to detect the expression of FOXP1 protein in ICC cancer tissues and the corresponding adjacent normal tissues. Kaplan-Meier method was used to calculate survival rates and to construct survival curves of patients. Cox regression model was used to analyze factors affecting prognosis of patients.Results:Forty-eight ICC cancer tissues and 40 corresponding paracancerous tissues were collected. The positive rates of FOXP1 proteins in ICC were significantly lower than the adjacent normal tissues [54.2%(26/48) vs. 92.5%(37/40), χ 2=15.76, P<0.05]. The degrees of tumor differentiation, lymph node metastasis, organ invasion and TNM staging were related to expression of FOXP1 ( P<0.05). Forty-two patients were followed-up with a median follow-up time of 11.5 (7.75, 19.25) months. Cox multivariate analysis revealed that invasion to adjacent organs, lymph node metastasis, high TNM staging (stage Ⅲ) and negative expression of FOXP1 were independent risk factors affecting overall survival of ICC patients. The overall survival and recurrence-free survival of FOXP1-positive ICC patients were 17.5 months and 15.5 months, which were significantly higher than the 14.0 months and 11.1 months, respectively, in FOXP1-negative patients. Conclusion:Negative FOXP1 expression was closely correlated with aggressive biological behavior and poor prognosis of ICC. FOXP1 may be used as new diagnostic and therapeutic targets.