Clinical significance of serum adipokines levels in lung cancer

Abstract

Adipokines have a significant effect on metabolism, immunoinflammatory responses as well as on carcinogenesis; therefore, we aimed at evaluating their potential predictive and prognostic significance in lung cancer. Eighty patients--mean age 62.9 ± 9.2 years--with previously untreated lung cancer (61 NSCLC and 19 SCLC) of all stages and 40 healthy individuals were enrolled in this study. Serum levels of leptin, adiponectin and ghrelin were measured using human Radioimmunoassay kits. Serum leptin levels in lung cancer patients were lower compared to control (p < 0.0001), while adiponectin and ghrelin levels were significantly increased in patients (p = 0.0003 and p = 0.0043, respectively). Additionally, the leptin/adiponectin ratio was significantly lower in the patients group compared to controls (p < 0.0001]. There was no association between serum levels of adipokines and any of the patient clinicopathological characteristics or response to therapy. Nevertheless, patients with lower values of serum leptin had shorter overall survival (p = 0.014), whereas multivariate analysis revealed leptin levels as an independent prognostic factor for survival (p = 0.024, HR 0.452, CI 95 % 0.232-0.899). These results suggest that adipokines may play a role in the pathogenesis of lung cancer, while leptin serum levels might provide useful prognostic information.

Are serum leptin levels a prognostic factor in advanced lung cancer?

“…Similar with Tas et al and Kerenidi et al, we found that serum leptin levels in advanced lung cancer patients were lower compared to those in healthy subjects (13,21). Although Werynska (22) et al found that cachectic patients have lower serum leptin levels, we did not fi nd statistical correlation between weight loss and serum leptin levels.…”

Serum and tissue leptin in lung cancer: A meta-analysis

“…Among them, fourteen included articles regarding the association between the serum leptin levels and lung cancer [13–17, 20, 24, 25, 28, 29, 31–33, 37], and seven included articles about the association between the leptin expression levels in tissue and lung cancer [18, 21, 23, 26, 30, 35, 36]. Ten of the 21 included articles were in English [13–18, 25, 29, 32, 33] and eleven were in Chinese [20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 28, 30, 31, 35–37].…”

“…Ten of the 21 included articles were in English [13–18, 25, 29, 32, 33] and eleven were in Chinese [20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 28, 30, 31, 35–37]. Among the studies, fourteen articles were conducted in Chinese people [15, 18, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 28–31, 35–37], and seven studies were conducted in Europeans [13, 14, 16, 17, 25, 32, 33]. The characteristics of included studies are summarized in Tables 1, 2 and 3.…”

“…Additionally, a growing body of studies has found that leptin is also involved in tumorigenesis and the progression of lung cancer. Among them, some studies have found that elevated serum leptin levels represent an independent risk factor for non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) [13–15], whereas other studies have reported significant correlation between decreased serum leptin levels and prognosis in lung cancer [16, 17]. Further, a few studies have indicated that the expression of leptin protein was significantly higher in lung cancer tissues than in normal lung tissues [18, 19].…”

Prognostic value of serum leptin in advanced lung adenocarcinoma patients with cisplatin/pemetrexed chemotherapy

“…However, the reduction of leptin was regardless of the response to chemotherapy and did not reach a statistical significance (P=0.06) in the study by Tas et al (19). In addition, the studies by Tas et al (19) and Kerenidi et al (31) showed that serum leptin levels in lung cancer patients were lower when compared with healthy individuals. The results of these studies are inconsistent with the present study and may in part reflect the various populations tested and the inherent variability in quantifying serum leptin using ELISA and radioimmunoassay.…”