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Polypoidal giant cancer cells in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer: observations from the Michigan Legacy Tissue Program

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Abstract

Despite early diagnosis and established protocols, a subset of prostate cancer patients will eventually be categorized as castration-resistant prostate cancer. Recently, it has been reported that these multi-modal therapy cases may harbor a special subset of cancer cells termed as polypoidal giant cancer cells (PGCC). These cells are phenotypically described either as possessing highly irregular polylobated nuclei or multiple pleomorphic nuclei. To identify and characterize the distribution of these cells, we created a cohort of 5 randomly selected cases of multi-modal therapy failure prostate cancer (16 selected non-osseous and osseous tumor sites) enrolled in Michigan Legacy Tissue Program. In all cases, specific “regions of interest” or “hot spots” within tumor areas showing an increased proportion of these multi-nucleated/polylobated cells under light microscopy were labeled as PGCC-rich area. On microscopic evaluation, overall mean count of PGCC was 42.4 ± 3.91 with case 2 in the study cohort with the highest number of average PGCC count of 17 ± 4.04. Site wise analysis showed retroperitoneal lymph node as the tissue with highest number of average PGCC number/site (5.0 ± 0.32). On correlating the average number of PGCC recorded with the time elapsed from last dose of chemotherapy administered to autopsy, the spearman correlation value (R) was 0.67, but the result was not statistically significant (p = 0.22). A systematic assessment of PGCC in a large stratified cohort of prostate cancer patients integrated with various histopathological and clinical parameters along with discovery of specific biomarkers for PGCC are the future studies suggested.

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Acknowledgements

Sathiya P Narayanan PhD, Jyoti Athanikar PhD

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Author notes

  1. Rahul Mannan and Xiaoming Wang contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pathology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Rahul Mannan, Xiaoming Wang, Pushpinder S. Bawa, Allecia Wilson, Jeffrey Jentzen, Arul M. Chinnaiyan & Rohit Mehra

  2. Michigan Center for Translational Pathology, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Rahul Mannan, Xiaoming Wang, Pushpinder S. Bawa, Arul M. Chinnaiyan & Rohit Mehra

  3. Rogel Cancer Center, Michigan Medicine, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Daniel E. Spratt, Arul M. Chinnaiyan, Zachery R. Reichert & Rohit Mehra

  4. Department of Urology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Arul M. Chinnaiyan

  5. Department of Radiation Oncology, Michigan Medicine, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Daniel E. Spratt

  6. Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Arul M. Chinnaiyan

  7. Division of Hematology/Oncology, Department of Internal Medicine, Michigan Medicine, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Zachery R. Reichert

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  1. Rahul Mannan
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  2. Xiaoming Wang
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Correspondence to Rohit Mehra.

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Mannan, R., Wang, X., Bawa, P.S. et al. Polypoidal giant cancer cells in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer: observations from the Michigan Legacy Tissue Program. Med Oncol 37, 16 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12032-020-1341-6

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