Department of Tumor Biological Treatment, The Third Affiliated Hospital, Soochow University, Changzhou, China.
Cancer Immunol Immunother. 2010 Nov;59(11):1707-14. doi: 10.1007/s00262-010-0900-7. Epub 2010 Aug 20.
To establish the prognostic value of B7-H4 expression by tumor cells in gastric cancer patients, we evaluated the association of B7-H4 expression with clinicopathologic factors and overall survival of gastric cancer patients. A retrospective cohort study including 156 gastric cancer patients was performed in the present report. Immunohistochemical assay was used to evaluate the expression of B7-H4 in the surgical specimens of gastric cancer tissues. Multi-univariate COX model was then used to evaluate the association of B7-H4 expression with the patients' survival and clinicopathological parameters. B7-H4 expression in the gastric cancer cells was observed in about 44.9% gastric cancer specimens. Univariate analysis demonstrated that there was no correlation between B7-H4 expression and sex, age, histological type, pathological grade or tumor size. In contrast, B7-H4 expression correlated positively with cancer invasiveness and lymph node metastasis. In addition, the median overall survival time of patients with lower B7-H4 expression was 13 months longer than that of patients with higher expression (chi(2) = 12.38, P < 0.0001), and the median disease-free survival time of patients with lower B7-H4 expression was significantly longer than that of patients with higher expression (33 vs. 16 months, chi(2) = 14.977, P < 0.0001). After adjustment for other confounding factors, the COX model analysis indicated that the death risk was significantly higher in patients with higher B7-H4 expression than those with lower expression (RR = 1.85, 95% CI = 1.15-2.96). The present study demonstrated that higher B7-H4 expression in cancer cells was associated with poor prognosis of gastric cancer patients. This is consistent with the idea that B7-H4 promotes cancer progression, likely via inhibition of anti-tumor immune responses.
为了确定肿瘤细胞 B7-H4 表达在胃癌患者中的预后价值，我们评估了 B7-H4 表达与胃癌患者临床病理因素和总生存的关系。本研究采用回顾性队列研究，纳入了 156 例胃癌患者。免疫组织化学检测用于评估胃癌组织中 B7-H4 的表达。然后采用多变量 COX 模型评估 B7-H4 表达与患者生存和临床病理参数的关系。在大约 44.9%的胃癌标本中观察到胃癌细胞中 B7-H4 的表达。单因素分析表明，B7-H4 表达与性别、年龄、组织学类型、病理分级或肿瘤大小无关。相反，B7-H4 表达与癌症侵袭性和淋巴结转移呈正相关。此外，B7-H4 表达较低的患者中位总生存时间比表达较高的患者长 13 个月（chi(2) = 12.38，P < 0.0001），B7-H4 表达较低的患者中位无病生存时间也明显长于表达较高的患者（33 个月比 16 个月，chi(2) = 14.977，P < 0.0001）。在调整其他混杂因素后，COX 模型分析表明，B7-H4 表达较高的患者死亡风险明显高于表达较低的患者（RR = 1.85，95%CI = 1.15-2.96）。本研究表明，癌细胞中 B7-H4 表达较高与胃癌患者预后不良有关。这与 B7-H4 促进癌症进展的观点一致，可能通过抑制抗肿瘤免疫反应。
