Clinical significance of molecular detection of carcinoma cells in lymph nodes and peripheral blood by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction in patients with gastrointestinal or breast carcinomas.

Abstract

It has been shown that RT-PCR is a powerful tool to detect CEA mRNA in the lymph nodes or the peripheral blood. This is potentially very useful to determine high-risk patients for metastasis. Serial analysis is warranted to assess the long-term significance of this method and its therapeutic and prognostic implications.

Quantitative evaluation of metastases in axillary lymph nodes of breast cancer

“…Recently, RT -PCR assays with tumour-specific gene markers such as CK19, CEA, MUC1, PIP, Mapsin and mammaglobin B have been widely used to detect occult metastasis in cancer patients (Noguchi et al, 1994(Noguchi et al, , 1996Schoenheld et al, 1994;Mori et al, 1995Mori et al, , 1998Kataoka et al, 2000;Masuda et al, 2000;Manzotti et al, 2001;Mitas et al, 2001). To date, however, no marker that is expressed in all breast cancer tissues, but not in normal lymph node has been available, partly because of the heterogeneity of marker gene expression in cancer cells.…”

“…Several reports have indicated that the detection of micrometastases using reverse transcriptase -polymerase chain reaction (RT -PCR) assay may be clinically important (Noguchi et al, 1994(Noguchi et al, , 1996Schoenheld et al, 1994;Mori et al, 1995Mori et al, , 1998Masuda et al, 2000;Manzotti et al, 2001). Moreover, screening for metastatic disease in axillary lymph nodes by RT -PCR amplification has been shown to be more sensitive and cost effective than serial sectioning and immunohistochemical staining (Lockett et al, 1998).…”

Detection of circulating tumor cells in patients with gastrointestinal tract cancer using RT-PCR and its clinical implications

“…Most of the available data related to the CEA mRNA detection indicate that the presence of circulating tumor cells correlates with the presence of distant metastasis (Funaki et al, 1996;Mori et al, 1996;Jonas et al, 1996;Mori et al, 1998;Castells et al, 1998) and is expected to be associated with a poor prognosis (Hardingham et al, 1995;Mori et al, 1998). But it is still uncertain of its clinical relevance, because a relatively high proportion of non-metastatic gastrointestinal cancer patients was also positive for CEA mRNA (Mori et al, 1996;Mori et al, 1998;Castells et al, 1998).…”

“…Among the target genes of this aim for RT-PCR, CEA mRNA seems to be the most frequently used for the detection in the blood of patients with gastrointestinal carcinomas (Funaki et al, 1996;Mori et al, 1996;Jonas et al, 1996;Mori et al, 1998;Castells et al, 1998), since it is expressed in almost all epithelial cells, including cancer cells, but not in nonepithelial cells (Shively and Beatty, 1985).…”

Prognostic significance of reverse transcriptase‐polymerase chain reaction measurement of carcinoembryonic antigen mRNA levels in tumor drainage blood and peripheral blood of patients with colorectal carcinoma

“…The sensitivity of our RT-PCR assay was 1 tumor cell per 10 6 normal mononuclear cells and, thus, was within the standard range. 4 -6,15 It has been reported that colorectal carcinoma cells were detected in 17.0 -41.1% of peripheral blood samples [5][6][7]23 and in 42% of tumor drainage blood samples. 24 In the current study, the detection rates of tumor cells in peripheral blood and tumor drainage blood were 34% and 68%, respectively, and were consistent with previous reports.…”