Correlation of programmed death ligand 1 and interleukin-10 expressions with the prognosis in uterine cervical cancer tissues / 肿瘤研究与临床

ABSTRACT

Objective:To investigate the correlation of the expressions of programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) and interleukin-10 (IL-10) with the prognosis in uterine cervical cancer tissues.Methods:A total of 82 patients with uterine cervical cancer hospitalized at Nantong Maternal and Child Health Hospital from January 2015 to December 2019 were retrospectively analyzed, and the clinicopathological data of all patients were collected and sorted out. Immunohistochemical method was used to detect the positive expression of PD-L1 protein in cancer tissues, and Western blot was used to detect the expression level of IL-10 protein in cancer tissues. The survival of all patients for 24-month follow-up was recorded and 82 patients were divided into the survival group and the death group. The clinicopathological characteristics and the expressions of PD-L1 and IL-10 in both groups were compared. Multivariate Cox proportional risk model was used to analyze the factors affecting the survival of patients with uterine cervical cancer. The value of PD-L1 and IL-10 expressions predicting the survival in uterine cervical cancer was evaluated by using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. The best cut-off value of IL-10 relative expression in cancer tissues obtained from ROC curve analysis predicting 24-month survival of patients was used to group; ≥ the best cut-off value was treated as IL-10 high expression group, and < the best cut-off value was treated as IL-10 low expression group. Kaplan-Meier method was used to compare the survival of PD-L1 positive and negative groups, IL-10 high and low expression groups.Results:There was no loss of follow-up in 82 patients during 24-month follow-up, of which 11 cases (13.4%) died and 71 cases (86.6%) survived. The proportion of patients with Federation International of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) staging Ⅲ-Ⅳ, poor differentiation, tumor long diameter > 4 cm and lymph node metastasis in the death group was higher than that of those in the survival group (all P < 0.05). PD-L1 was positive in 9 of 11 patients in the death group and 11 of 71 patients in the survival group ( P < 0.001). The relative expression level of IL-10 protein in the death group was higher than that in the survival group (1.18±0.32 vs. 0.89±0.21, P < 0.001). Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that FIGO staging, tissue differentiation degree, tumor long diameter, whether lymph node had metastasis or not, whether PD-L1 was positive and the relative expression level of IL-10 protein were independent factors affecting patients' 24-month survival (all P < 0.05). ROC curve analysis showed that the area under the curve (AUC) of PD-L1 and IL-10 single and the combination of both predicting 24-month survival in cancer tissues was 0.748 (95% CI 0.664-0.894), 0.710 (95% CI 0.655-0.884) and 0.839 (95% CI 0.742-0.951), respectively. There were 20 cases in PD-L1-positive group and 62 cases in PD-L1-negative group. The best cut-off value of relative expression level of IL-10 protein was 7.12. There were 19 cases in IL-10 high expression group and 63 cases in IL-10 low expression group. The overall survival of patients in PD-L1-positive group was worse than that in PD-L1-negative group (24-month overall survival rate 55.0% vs. 96.8%, P = 0.001). The overall survival of patients in IL-10 high expression group was worse than that in IL-10 low expression group (24-month overall survival rate 57.9% vs. 95.2%, P = 0.001). Conclusions:The prognosis of patients with positive PD-L1 and IL-10 high expressions in uterine cervical cancer tissues is poor. The combined detection of PD-L1 and IL-10 has a high predictive effect on the prognosis.