Metastatic lymph node ratio and Lauren classification are independent prognostic markers for survival rates of patients with gastric cancer

A Retrospective Analysis of the Lauren Classification in the Choice of XELOX or SOX as an Adjuvant Chemotherapy for Gastric Cancer

BACKGROUND

We aim to retrospectively explore the guiding value of the Lauren classification for patients who have undergone D2 gastrectomy to choose oxaliplatin plus capecitabine (XELOX) or oxaliplatin plus S-1 (SOX) as a further systemic treatment after the operation.

METHODS

We collected data of 406 patients with stage III gastric cancer(GC)after radical D2 resection and regularly received XELOX or SOX adjuvant treatment after surgery and followed them for at least five years. According to the Lauren classification, we separated patients out into intestinal type (IT) GC together with non-intestinal type(NIT) GC. According to the chemotherapy regimen, we separated patients into the SOX group together with the XELOX group.

RESULTS

Among non-intestinal type patients, the 3-year DFS rates in the SOX group and the XELOX group were 72.5%, respectively; 54.5% (P=0.037); The 5-year OS rates were 66.8% and 51.8% respectively (P=0.038), both of which were statistically significant.

CONCLUSION

The patients of non-intestinal type GC may benefit from the SOX regimen. Differences were counted without being statistically significant with intestinal-type GC in the SOX or XELOX groups.

HER2 protein expression correlates with Lauren classification and P53 in gastric cancer patients

Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) is a key pathological characteristic of gastric cancer (GC). However, the clinical significance of HER2 expression in gastric carcinoma remains controversial. The purpose of this study was to analyze the clinicopathological characteristics of HER2 protein expression, Lauren classification and tumor protein p53 (P53) expression and to evaluate the clinical significance of HER2 protein expression. A total of 176 consecutive patients were prospectively recruited between January 2014 and December 2016 at the Second Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang University School of Medicine. Histological analysis of the resected tissue was performed for HER2 protein expression using immunohistochemistry (IHC) and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH). Additionally, the expression status of HER2 protein and clinicopathological features were analyzed using the chi-squared (χ2) test. Survival analysis was performed using the Kaplan-Meier method, and differences between the survival curves were determined using the log-rank test. All statistical analyses were conducted using SPSS 22.0 statistical software program (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY). A total of 176 patients with GC were enrolled in this study. Intratumoral heterogeneity of HER2 protein overexpression was observed in 42 of 176 cases with IHC grade 2+, accompanied by FISH positivity and IHC grade 3+. HER2 protein expression was correlated with tumor differentiation (P < .001), Lauren classification (P = .001), Borrmann type (P = .003) and P53 expression (P < .001). HER2 protein positivity was associated with significantly higher overall survival (OS) (P = .038). Overexpression of HER2 protein was observed in 23.9% of the cases and was significantly related to the Lauren intestinal subtype and P53 negative expression. HER2 protein overexpression was independently associated with higher OS.

Clinicopathological differences, risk factors and prognostic scores for western patients with intestinal and diffuse-type gastric cancer

BACKGROUND

In the molecular era, the Laurén system is still a cost-effective and widely implemented classification for gastric cancer (GC) and it has been recently associated with clinical, histological and molecular features of these tumors. Despite recent advances in the understanding of the molecular biology of GC, there is a need to develop new prognostic tools for patient stratification in clinical practice. Thus, the identification of easily available prognostic factors in patients with intestinal and diffuse-type tumors can significantly improve risk assessment and patient stratification in GC.

AIM

To identify clinicopathological differences, risk factors, and to develop cost-effective prognostic scores for patients with intestinal and diffuse-type GC.

METHODS

Retrospective study of all patients undergoing surgery for GC at a tertiary referral center from 2001 to 2019. 286 cases met inclusion criteria (intestinal: 190, diffuse: 96). Clinical data and gross findings were collected. All specimens were reviewed by two independent pathologists and a detailed protocol for histologic evaluation was followed. Five tissue microarrays (TMAs) were constructed and sections of the TMA block were immunostained for HERCEPTEST, MSH2, MSH6, MLH1 and PMS2. Statistical analyses were performed and prognostic scores were developed based on hazard ratios.

RESULTS

Intestinal and diffuse-type GC showed different epidemiological, clinicopathological and prognostic features. Diffuse tumors were significantly associated with younger age, less symptomatology, flat morphology, deeper invasion, perineural infiltration, advanced stage at diagnosis, administration of adjuvant therapy and poorer prognosis. Intestinal lesions were fungoid or polypoid, showed necrosis, desmoplasia, microsatellite instability and HERCEPTEST positivity and were diagnosed at earlier stages. Tumor depth, desmoplasia, macroscopic type and lymph node involvement were independently related to the Laurén subtype. Furthermore, intestinal and diffuse GC were associated with different risk factors for progression and death. Vascular invasion, perineural infiltration and growth pattern were important prognostic factors in intestinal-type GC. On the contrary, tumor size and necrosis were significant prognosticators in diffuse-type GC. Our recurrence and cancer-specific death scores for patients with intestinal and diffuse-type GC showed an excellent patient stratification into three (diffuse GC) or four (intestinal) prognostic groups.

CONCLUSION

Our findings support that Laurén subtypes represent different clinicopathological and biological entities. The development of specific prognostic scores is a useful and cost-effective strategy to improve risk assessment in GC.

Neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio and C-reactive protein-to-albumin ratio as prognostic factors for unresectable advanced or recurrent gastric cancer

PURPOSE

This study evaluated the prognostic value of C-reactive protein-to-albumin (CAR) and neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratios (NLR) in conjunction with host-related factors in patients with unresectable advanced or recurrent gastric cancer.

METHODS

A total of 411 patients with unresectable advanced gastric cancer were treated at Kochi Medical School between 2007 and 2019. Associations between clinicopathological parameters and systemic inflammatory and nutritional markers, including CAR and NLR, with overall survival were analyzed retrospectively.

RESULTS

The optimal cut-off values of predicted median survival time were 0.096 (sensitivity, 74.9%; specificity, 42.5%) for CAR and 3.47 (sensitivity, 64.1%; specificity, 57.5%) for NLR, based on the results of receiver operating characteristic analysis. A weak significant positive correlation was identified between CAR and NLR (r = 0.388, P < 0.001). The median survival time was significantly higher in patients with intestinal-type than those with diffuse-type histology (18.3 months vs. 9.5 months; P = 0.001), CAR < 0.096 than those with CAR ≥ 0.096 (14.8 months vs. 9.9 months; P < 0.029), and those with NLR < 3.47 than NLR ≥ 3.47 (14.7 months vs. 8.8 months; P < 0.001). Multivariate survival analysis revealed that diffuse-type histology (hazard ratio (HR) 1.865; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.397-2.490; P < 0.001)), 1 or more performance status (HR 11.510; 95% CI 7.941-16.683; P < 0.001), and NLR ≥ 3.47 (HR 1.341; 95% CI 1.174-1.769; P = 0.023) were significantly associated with independent predictors of worse prognosis.

CONCLUSIONS

High CAR and NLR are associated with poor survival in patients with unresectable and recurrent gastric cancer.

Is there still a place for conventional histopathology in the age of molecular medicine? Laurén classification, inflammatory infiltration and other current topics in gastric cancer diagnosis and prognosis

Gastric cancer (GC) is the fifth most common cancer and the third cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide. In western countries, more than half of GC patients are diagnosed at advanced stages and 5-year survival rates range between 20-30%. The only curative treatment is surgery, and despite recent advances in oncological therapies, GC prognosis is still poor. The main prognostic tool for patient categorization and treatment selection is the TNM classification, but its limitations are being increasingly recognized. Early recurrences may occur in early-stage disease, and patients at the same stage show heterogeneous outcomes. Thus, there is a need to improve GC stratification and to identify new prognostic factors, which may allow us to select drug-susceptible populations, refine patient grouping for clinical trials and discover new therapeutic targets. Molecular classifications have been developed, but they have not been translated to the clinical practice. On the other hand, histological assessment is cheap and widely available, and it is still a mainstay in the era of molecular medicine. Furthermore, histological features are acquiring new roles as reflectors of the genotype-phenotype correlation, and their potential impact on patient management is currently being analyzed. The aim of this literature review is to provide a modern overview of the histological assessment of GC. In this study, we discuss recent topics on the histological diagnosis of GC, focusing on the current role of Laurén classification and the potential value of new histological features in GC, such as inflammatory infiltration and tumor budding.

Analysis of the Incidence and Survival of Gastric Cancer Based on the Lauren Classification: A Large Population-Based Study Using SEER

Background: Limited evidence exists on the incidence of gastric cancer (GC), and contradictory results exist for the prognosis of GC based on the Lauren classification. We analyzed the incidence and survival of GC based on the Lauren classification. Methods: The Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database from 1975 through 2015 was used to identify all patients with surgically resected, histologically diagnosed intestinal or diffused-type GC. Propensity score matching was used to analyze the association between the Lauren classification type and prognosis. Results: The trend of total GC incidence showed an obvious decrease (APC = -1.51, 95% CI: -2.31 to -1.01) as well as that of the intestinal type (APC = -1.43, 95% CI: -2.01 to -1.12). However, we found that the relative incidence of the diffused type was increased (APC = 0.6, 95% CI: 0.41-0.82). The trend of the total incidence of GC (APC = -1.31, 95% CI: -1.91 to -1.03) and that of the intestinal type (APC = -1.11, 95% CI: -1.53 to -0.98) was decreased in 40-49-year-olds, but that of the diffused type was increased (APC = 1.5, 95% CI: 1.2-1.72). We found that trends in GC incidence exhibited a similar pattern in the regional and distant stages and showed a decrease from 1975 through 2015. However, the incidence rate of the local stage was increased, with an APC of 0.5 (95% CI: 0.3-0.7). We identified 15,989 GC cases from the SEER database, including 13,852 intestinal-type and 2,138 diffused-type cases. The 1,336 intestinal-type cases were matched with 1,336 diffused-type cases using propensity score matching (PSM), and patients with the diffused type had a better prognosis than patients with the intestinal type (HR = 0.56, 95% CI: 0.45-0.78). However, we found that patients with diffused-type GC had worse survival than patients with intestinal-type GC in the cohort from Renji Hospital (P < 0.001). Conclusion: The total incidence of GC and that of the intestinal-type GC decreased, but the incidence of diffused-type GC increased in 40-49-year-olds. Diffused types of GCs may have a different prognosis compared to intestinal-type GCs in different patient cohorts. Nevertheless, these results should be interpreted with caution in assessing the prognosis in combination with other factors.

Evaluation of Systemic Inflammatory Response and Nutritional Biomarkers as Predictive Factors in Patients with Recurrent Gastric Cancer

BACKGROUND

The present study sought to evaluate host-related factors as predictors in patients receiving chemotherapy for recurrent advanced gastric cancer.

METHODS

Sixty-three patients were enrolled in the study and received chemotherapy for recurrent gastric cancer at the Kochi Medical School from 2008 to 2015. Clinicopathological information and systemic inflammatory response data were obtained retrospectively to investigate associations between baseline cancer-related prognostic variables and survival outcomes.

RESULTS

The median survival time was significantly higher for patients with a Glasgow prognostic score (GPS) of 0 compared to a GPS of 1 or 2 (18.2 vs. 7.1 months; p = 0.006), and for patients in the normal range for carbohydrate antigen-125 (CA125) compared to higher levels (17.9 vs. 4.1 months; p = 0.003). There was no significant influence on overall survival by age, gender, disease status, metastatic site, time to recurrence, carcinoembryonic antigen level, CA19-9 level, prognostic nutrition index, or neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio according to the results of the univariate log-rank tests. Multivariate survival analysis identified a GPS of 1 or 2 (hazard ratio, 3.520; 95% confidence interval, 1.343-9.227; p = 0.010) and a high CA125 level (hazard ratio, 3.135; 95% confidence interval, 1.276-7.697; p = 0.013) as significant independent predictors associated with a poorer prognosis in the studied group of cancer patients.

CONCLUSIONS

A GPS of 1 or 2 and a high level of CA125 are independent predictors of a poorer prognosis in patients receiving chemotherapy for recurrent gastric cancer.

The Role of the Lymph Node Ratio in Advanced Gastric Cancer After Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy

The ratio of positive lymph nodes (LNs) to the total LN harvest is called the LN ratio (LNR). It is an independent prognostic factor in gastric cancer (GC). The aim of the current study was to evaluate the impact of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) on the LNR (ypLNR) in patients with advanced GC. We retrospectively analyzed the data of patients with advanced GC, who underwent gastrectomy with N1 and N2 (D2) lymphadenectomy between August 2011 and January 2019 in the Department of Surgical Oncology at the Medical University of Lublin. The exclusion criteria were a lack of preoperative NAC administration, suboptimal lymphadenectomy (<D2 and/or removal of less than 15 lymph nodes), and a lack of data on tumor regression grading (TRG) in the final pathological report. A total of 95 patients were eligible for the analysis. A positive correlation was found between the ypLNR and tumor diameter (p < 0.001), post treatment pathological Tumour (ypT) stage (p < 0.001), Laurén histological subtype (p = 0.0001), and the response to NAC (p < 0.0001). A multivariate analysis demonstrated that the ypLNR was an independent prognostic factor in patients with intestinal type GC (p = 0.0465) and in patients with no response to NAC (p = 0.0483). In the resection specimen, tumor diameter and depth of infiltration, Laurén histological subtype, and TRG may reflect the impact of NAC on LN status, as quantified by ypLNR in advanced GC.

Prognostic significance of serum alkaline phosphatase and lactate dehydrogenase levels in patients with unresectable advanced gastric cancer

BACKGROUND

This study evaluated the prognostic value of alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) together with host-related factors in patients with unresectable advanced gastric cancer.

METHODS

The study enrolled 262 patients who received chemotherapy for unresectable advanced gastric cancer at Kochi Medical School from 2007 to 2015. Clinicopathological information and systemic inflammatory response data were analyzed for associations between baseline cancer-related prognostic variables and survival outcomes.

RESULTS

The median survival time was significantly lower for patients with high ALP, high LDH, high total bilirubin, high aspartate aminotransferase, high alanine transaminase, high gamma-glutamyltransferase, high creatinine, a Glasgow prognostic score (GPS) of 1 or 2 score compared to GPS 0, higher compared to lower neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR) 3.9, lower compared to higher prognostic nutrition index 36.1, T3-4 compared to T1-2 tumor and diffuse-type compared to intestinal-type histology. Multivariate survival analysis identified high ALP 322 (HR 1.808; 95% CI 1.015-3.220; P = 0.044), T2-3 (HR 2.622; 95% CI 1.224-5.618; P = 0.013), and diffuse-type gastric cancer (HR 2.325; 95% CI 1.341-4.032; P = 0.003) as significant independent predictors of worse prognosis in the studied group of cancer patients.

CONCLUSIONS

High level of ALP is an independent, worse prognosis factor for patients receiving chemotherapy for unresectable and recurrent gastric cancer.