Department of Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Faculty of Medicine, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.
Clinical Oncology and Nuclear Medicine Department, Faculty of Medicine, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.
J Cell Biochem. 2019 Mar;120(3):3459-3466. doi: 10.1002/jcb.27620. Epub 2018 Sep 23.
Breast cancer is the second most common cancer diagnosed worldwide. Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive breast cancer represents about 20% to 30% of all breast cancers. Trastuzumab is used in the treatment of HER2-positive breast cancer. MicroRNA-21 (miR-21) is an oncomiR that acts by inhibiting many tumor-suppressor genes. We analyzed the relative expression levels of serum miR-21 in 20 HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer patients before and after 3 months of treatment with trastuzumab. miR-21 levels decreased with a high significant difference after trastuzumab therapy (P = 0.001). Although miR-21 expression levels were lower in responders than in nonresponders, the difference was not statistically significant ( P = 0.6). Our results demonstrated a significant negative correlation between its basal expression, expression levels after treatment, and time to progression ( P = 0.03 and 0.01, respectively). These results make miR-21 a potential prognostic factor for HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer patients. Additionally, it can be an interesting potential target in therapy using antisense oligonucleotides for miR-21.
乳腺癌是全球第二大常见癌症。人表皮生长因子受体 2（HER2）阳性乳腺癌约占所有乳腺癌的 20%至 30%。曲妥珠单抗用于治疗 HER2 阳性乳腺癌。microRNA-21（miR-21）是一种致癌 miRNA，通过抑制许多肿瘤抑制基因发挥作用。我们分析了 20 例 HER2 阳性转移性乳腺癌患者在接受曲妥珠单抗治疗前 3 个月和治疗后的血清 miR-21 的相对表达水平。曲妥珠单抗治疗后 miR-21 水平显著降低（P=0.001）。尽管应答者的 miR-21 表达水平低于无应答者，但差异无统计学意义（P=0.6）。我们的结果表明，其基础表达水平、治疗后表达水平与进展时间之间存在显著负相关（P=0.03 和 0.01）。这些结果表明，miR-21 可能是 HER2 阳性转移性乳腺癌患者的潜在预后因素。此外，它可能是一种有趣的潜在治疗靶点，可使用针对 miR-21 的反义寡核苷酸。
