Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, Gunma University Graduate School of Medicine, Gunma, Japan.
Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, Gunma University Graduate School of Medicine, Gunma, Japan
Anticancer Res. 2020 Jun;40(6):3559-3564. doi: 10.21873/anticanres.14345.
BACKGROUND/AIM: We aimed to elucidate the clinical implication of the epithelial-mesenchymal plasticity of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in patients with head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC).
CTCs isolated from 44 patients with non-recurrent/metastatic HNSCC and 42 with recurrent/metastatic (R/M) HNSCC were classified into four epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) statuses based on the expression of epithelial (keratin 19) and mesenchymal (vimentin) markers and the relationships between EMT status in CTCs and clinical factors were investigated.
EM CTC phenotype was more frequent in patients without recurrence/metastasis (p=0.0468) and was also more frequent in those with a complete response (p=0.0346). The EM phenotype constituted the major proportion of the CTCs detected in patients with R/M HNSCC (p=0.0374).
CTCs may play unique roles at various stages of metastasis through transitioning from epithelial to mesenchymal phenotypes.
背景/目的：我们旨在阐明头颈部鳞状细胞癌（HNSCC）患者循环肿瘤细胞（CTC）上皮-间充质可塑性的临床意义。
从 44 例非复发性/转移性 HNSCC 和 42 例复发性/转移性（R/M）HNSCC 患者中分离出 CTCs，根据上皮（角蛋白 19）和间充质（波形蛋白）标志物的表达，将 CTCs 分为四种上皮-间充质转化（EMT）状态，并研究 EMT 状态与临床因素之间的关系。
无复发/转移患者的 EMT CTC 表型更为常见（p=0.0468），且完全缓解者更为常见（p=0.0346）。在 R/M HNSCC 患者中，EM 表型构成了检测到的 CTCs 的主要比例（p=0.0374）。
CTC 可能通过从上皮向间充质表型转化，在转移的各个阶段发挥独特的作用。
