Presence in the Pre-Surgical Fine-Needle Aspiration of Potential Thyroid Biomarkers Previously Identified in the Post-Surgical One

Abstract

Fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNA) is usually applied to distinguish benign from malignant thyroid nodules. However, cytological analysis cannot always allow a proper diagnosis. We believe that the improvement of the diagnostic capability of pre-surgical FNA could avoid unnecessary thyroidectomy. In a previous study, we performed a proteome analysis to examine FNA collected after thyroidectomy. With the present study, we examined the applicability of these results on pre-surgical FNA. We collected pre-surgical FNA from 411 consecutive patients, and to obtain a correct comparison with our previous results, we processed only benign (n = 114), papillary classical variant (cPTC) (n = 34) and papillary tall cell variant (TcPTC) (n = 14) FNA. We evaluated levels of five proteins previously found up-regulated in thyroid cancer with respect to benign nodules. ELISA and western blot (WB) analysis were used to assay levels of L-lactate dehydrogenase B chain (LDHB), Ferritin heavy chain, Ferritin light chain, Annexin A1 (ANXA1), and Moesin in FNA. ELISA assays and WB analysis confirmed the increase of LDHB, Moesin, and ANXA1 in pre-surgical FNA of thyroid papillary cancer. Sensitivity and specificity of ANXA1 were respectively 87 and 94% for cPTC, 85 and 100% for TcPTC. In conclusion, a proteomic analysis of FNA from patients with thyroid nodules may help to distinguish benign versus malignant thyroid nodules. Moreover, ANXA1 appears to be an ideal candidate given the high sensitivity and specificity obtained from ROC curve analysis.

Proteomics for the diagnosis of thyroid lesions: preliminary report

“…In the present study, we investigate the potential application of MALDI‐IMS in thyroid cytopathology for other lesions that are difficult to diagnose. Moreover, we suggest, based on these results, that larger trials should be included in proteomic thyroid pathology research in order to promote investigations that could potentially enable the discovery of more feasible and cost‐effective diagnostic tools (immunohistochemistry) …”

Prediction of novel target genes and pathways involved in tall cell variant papillary thyroid carcinoma

“…[13] A few studies have described the identification of biomarkers to improve the differential diagnosis of TCPTC from cPTC lesions. [39,40] For example, Nardone et al have revealed that TCPTC specimens expressed significantly greater levels of c-Met than other forms of PTC and benign thyroid disease. [40] In this study, we revealed for the first time that several biomarkers showed excellent predictive values not only for the differential diagnosis of TCPTC from normal tissues but also for the differential diagnosis of TCPTC from cPTC tissues.…”

Comparative proteomic analysis of malignant pleural mesothelioma: Focusing on the biphasic subtype

“…For 1D western blot (WB), all samples were processed to validate different protein expressions found with 2D analysis. Aliquots (25 μg of proteins) of each sample (23 E-PM, 10 B-PM, 14 benign, and 14 lung carcinoma) were solubilized with a SDS sample buffer (Laemmli solution), and proteins were separated by 12% SDS-PAGE under reducing conditions and WB was carried out as previously described [14] . Before blocking the nitrocellulose, membranes were reversibly stained with 1 mM RuBP as previously described [10] .…”