Abstract
Background
Although targeted therapies and immunotherapy have achieved significant clinical benefits in patients with certain pathological types of lung cancer. However, prognosis for patients with lung adenocarcinoma still remains unsatisfactory. It is of extremely importance to find ideal prognostic indicators to predict the prognosis of lung adenocarcinoma patients, especially for patients with early and locally advanced-stage lung adenocarcinoma. The purpose of this study is to elucidate the significance of Insulin-like growth factor receptor 1 (IGFR1) and Vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGF-A) expression in predicting progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) in patients with early and locally advanced-stage lung adenocarcinoma.
Methods
In this study, IGFR1 and VEGF-A expression on 119 specimens of patients early and locally advanced-stage lung adenocarcinoma were analyzed by immunohistochemistry with an H-score system.
Results
Both high IGFR1 expression and VEGF-A expression patients were resulted in 59 (49.6%) separately. The numbers and proportions of IGFR1−&VEGF-A− subgroup, IGFR1−&VEGF-A+ subgroup, IGFR1+&VEGF-A− subgroup and IGFR1+&VEGF-A+ subgroup are 23 (19.3%), 37 (31.1%), 37 (31.1%) and 22 (18.5%) respectively. High IGFR1 expression was significantly associated with both poor PFS and OS of all patients in a univariate analysis. Multivariable analysis showed that patients with IGFR1+&VEGF-A+ expression exhibited a worst PFS and OS in the subgroup of lung adenocarcinoma patients with EGFR mutation.
Conclusions
These results suggest that IGFR1+&VEGF-A+ is expected to be a disadvantageous factor for prognosis in the subgroup of EGFR mutation in patients with early and locally advanced-stage lung adenocarcinoma. What’s more, this study may provide the theoretical possibility to screen optimal population for a combination therapy with anti-VEGF and anti-IGFR1 in patients with early and locally advanced-stage lung adenocarcinoma.
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Data availability
The data generated or analysed during current study are included in this published article and its supplementary information files.
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Funding
This work was supported in part by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.82272686, Tingting Qin and Grant No.82203628, Jingya Wang), Natural Science Foundation of Tianjin (Grant No.21JCYBJC01000, Tingting Qin), Tianjin Key Medical Discipline (Specialty) Construction Project (Grant No.TJYXZDXK-010A). This work was supported by Cancer Biobank of Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute & Hospital.
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TWL and TTQ analyzed and interpreted the patient data. TWL and LJX performed IHC. WQD, TM and YJW evaluated the data. TTQ and TWL were the major contributors in writing the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital (Tianjin, China) and it conforms to the provisions of in accordance with the Helsinki Declarations revised in 2013, approved the use of human tissues for this study (EK2018039). The study outcomes will not affect the future management of the patients.
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Liu, W., Xia, J., Du, Q. et al. Clinico-pathological characteristics of IGFR1 and VEGF-A co-expression in early and locally advanced-stage lung adenocarcinoma. J Cancer Res Clin Oncol 149, 16365–16376 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00432-023-05371-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00432-023-05371-0