Department of Surgery, Nara Medical University, Nara, Japan.
Clin Exp Immunol. 2012 May;168(2):186-91. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2249.2012.04565.x.
Memory T cells survive for many months and years and are critically important for host defence in humans. In tumour immunity, they have been also suggested to play a significant role in tumour progression and metastasis. However, the role of memory T cells in actual human cancer remains largely unknown. In this study, the clinical importance of tumour-infiltrating CD45RO(+) memory T cells was investigated in human oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). CD45RO(+) T cells were evaluated by immunohistochemistry in primary OSCC tumours from 105 patients. Patients were classified into two groups as CD45RO(+hi) or CD45RO(+lo) based on the number of cells stained positively for CD45RO. No significant difference was observed between CD45RO status and several clinicopathological prognostic factors. However, the postoperative overall and disease-free survival for CD45RO(+hi) patients was significantly better than for CD45RO(+lo) patients. Furthermore, there were significant correlations of CD45RO status in the primary tumour with postoperative lymph node and pulmonary recurrence, suggesting that memory T cells may control postoperative metastatic recurrence. Most importantly, CD45RO(+) memory T cell status has a significant prognostic value for OSCC independently of conventional tumour-node-metastasis (TNM) classification. Our study may provide a rationale for developing a novel immunotherapy in intentional induction of memory T cells for the treatment of oesophageal cancer.
记忆 T 细胞可以存活数月甚至数年，对人类宿主防御至关重要。在肿瘤免疫中，它们也被认为在肿瘤进展和转移中发挥重要作用。然而，记忆 T 细胞在实际人类癌症中的作用在很大程度上仍然未知。在这项研究中，研究人员研究了肿瘤浸润性 CD45RO(+)记忆 T 细胞在人类食管鳞状细胞癌 (OSCC) 中的临床重要性。通过免疫组织化学方法在 105 例原发性 OSCC 肿瘤中评估 CD45RO(+)T 细胞。根据 CD45RO 染色阳性细胞的数量，将患者分为 CD45RO(+hi)或 CD45RO(+lo)两组。CD45RO 状态与几个临床病理预后因素之间没有观察到显著差异。然而，CD45RO(+hi)患者的术后总生存率和无病生存率明显优于 CD45RO(+lo)患者。此外，原发性肿瘤中 CD45RO 状态与术后淋巴结和肺部复发之间存在显著相关性，表明记忆 T 细胞可能控制术后转移复发。最重要的是，CD45RO(+)记忆 T 细胞状态对 OSCC 的预后具有独立于传统肿瘤-淋巴结-转移 (TNM) 分类的显著预测价值。我们的研究可能为开发一种新的免疫疗法提供依据，即有意诱导记忆 T 细胞治疗食管癌。
