Molecular Detection of Cytokeratin-19–Positive Cells in the Peripheral Blood of Patients With Operable Breast Cancer: Evaluation of Their Prognostic Significance

Abstract

Molecular detection of CK-19 mRNA-positive cells by RT-PCR in the peripheral blood of patients with stages I and II breast cancer before initiation of adjuvant therapy has independent prognostic value as a marker of poor clinical outcome.

Detection of occult HER2 mRNA-positive tumor cells in the peripheral blood of patients with operable breast cancer: evaluation of their prognostic relevance

“…The detection of occult tumor cells either in the bone marrow or the peripheral blood has been demonstrated to represent an independent prognostic factor for disease relapse and reduced survival [2][3][4][5][6]. Indeed, a meta-analysis involving 4,703 patients with stage I-III breast cancer confirmed the independent prognostic value of DTCs [7].…”

Relevance of circulating tumor cells, extracellular nucleic acids, and exosomes in breast cancer

“…More recent reports have demonstrated the prognostic significance of CK19 mRNA-positive CTCs in patients with early stage breast cancer [103][104][105]. Studies that investigated the prognostic value of CTCs/DTCs at the time of completion of adjuvant therapy [42, 106,107] showed that the detection of DTCs [42,108] and CTCs [106] after the completion of chemotherapy is associated with an unfavorable clinical outcome [103,105]; further reviewed by Ignatiadis et al [109].…”

“…Studies that investigated the prognostic value of CTCs/DTCs at the time of completion of adjuvant therapy [42, 106,107] showed that the detection of DTCs [42,108] and CTCs [106] after the completion of chemotherapy is associated with an unfavorable clinical outcome [103,105]; further reviewed by Ignatiadis et al [109]. In keeping with this work suggesting diagnostic and prognostic relevance for CK19, more recently full-length CK19 has been detected in bone marrow specimens from breast cancer patients and is associated with the presence of overt metastases and poor survival rates [110].…”

Effect of different cytokines on mammaglobin and maspin gene expression in normal leukocytes: possible relevance to the assays for the detection of micrometastatic breast cancer

“…This assumption is apparently supported by some prospective studies suggesting that the presence of isolated tumour cells in bone marrow or peripheral blood is an independent prognostic factor (Diel et al, 1996;Braun et al, 2000;Stathopoulou et al, 2002). However, the literature reports conflicting results; so this subject is still under discussion (Jiang et al, 2002;Ozbas et al, 2003;Pantel et al, 2003).…”

“…Several studies suggest that these objectives can be achieved with the current assays (Cote et al, 1991;Harbeck et al, 1994;Diel et al, 1996;Smith et al, 2000;Terstappen et al, 2000;Gebauer et al, 2001;Jiang et al, 2002;Ozbas et al, 2003;Pantel et al, 2003) and in a few of them the presence of disseminated tumour cells in bone marrow or peripheral blood is recognised as an independent prognostic factor (Diel et al, 1996;Braun et al, 2000;Stathopoulou et al, 2002). However, the literature reports conflicting results and the clinical value of these assays remains to be proven basically because it is uncertain whether the published assays have enough sensitivity, specificity and consistency to be reliably integrated into prospective studies provided with adequate statistical power to answer the most relevant clinical questions (Jiang et al, 2002;Ozbas et al, 2003;Pantel et al, 2003).…”