Dendritic Cell Subpopulations Are Associated with Prognostic Characteristics of Breast Cancer after Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy-An Observational Study

Breast cancer (BC) is the most prevalent malignancy in women and researchers have strived to develop optimal strategies for its diagnosis and management. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC), which reduces tumor size, risk of metastasis and patient mortality, often also allows for a de-escalation of breast and axillary surgery. Nonetheless, complete pathological response (pCR) is achieved in no more than 40% of patients who underwent NAC. Dendritic cells (DCs) are professional antigen-presenting cells present in the tumor microenvironment. The multitude of their subtypes was shown to be associated with the pathological and clinical characteristics of BC, but it was not evaluated in BC tissue after NAC. We found that highe r densities of CD123+ plasmacytoid DCs (pDCs) were present in tumors that did not show pCR and had a higher residual cancer burden (RCB) score and class. They were of higher stage and grade and more frequently HER2-negative. The density of CD123+ pCDs was an independent predictor of pCR in the studied group. DC-LAMP+ mature DCs (mDCs) were also related to characteristics of clinical relevance (i.e., pCR, RCB, and nuclear grade), although no clear trends were identified. We conclude that CD123+ pDCs are candidates for a novel biomarker of BC response to NAC.

Distribution of DC Subtypes: CD83+, DC-LAMP+, CD1a+, CD1c+, CD123+, and DC-SIGN+ in the Tumor Microenvironment of Endometrial Cancers-Correlation with Clinicopathologic Features

Treatment options for endometrial cancer (EC) do not provide satisfactory survival improvement for advanced cases, hence the interest in novel therapies utilizing immunological regulatory mechanisms. Measures to modify the functionality of dendritic cells (DCs) found in TME are intensively investigated, given that DCs play a crucial role in inducing antitumor immunity. Samples of malignant endometrial neoplasms obtained from 94 patients were immunohistochemically stained with selected antibodies. Counts of positively identified DCs were correlated with clinical advancement and histological malignancy of cancers. The most prominent DC subtypes were immature DC-SIGN+ or CD123+. Mature CD83+ DCs were the fewest. We found a significant divergence of grade value distribution between cancers of different DCs' CD1a+ counts. The DC-LAMP+ count was positively associated with grade. Cancers with the least DC CD1c+ or DC CD123+ had higher pT scores than ones that were more heavily infiltrated. ECs can suppress immune cells, hence the predominance of immature DCs in our samples. Associations between DC counts and clinicopathological features of EC were observed only for a few subsets, which was plausibly due to the low diversity of the obtained samples or the small group size. Predictive abilities of particular DC immune subsets within EC's TME remain ambiguous, which calls for further research.

[Fertility-sparing surgical management of ovarian cancer]

INTRODUCTION

Ovarian cancer (OC) continues to be one of the greatest challenges of modern oncology gynecology Most patients are diagnosed in the advanced stage of the disease, which requires aggressive and extensive surgical intervention. In approximately 8% of the cases, OC affects women <40 years of age. Among them, early-stage OC FIGO IA accounts for 40% of the affected individuals, which allows for fertility-sparing surgical management.

OBJECTIVES

The aim of the study was to evaluate the efficacy of fertility-sparing management in OC women, with tumor limited to one ovary who wish to preserve their fertility

MATERIAL AND METHODS

A total of 43 women with OC limited to one ovary (26 with borderline malignant tumors and 17 with invasive tumor FIGO IA) underwent surgical sparing therapy Disease recurrence rate as the measure of the quality of treatment and the number of pregnancies, together with their course, as the measure of the effectiveness of the fertility-sparing therapy were evaluated.

RESULTS

The observation period, from 4-10 years for borderline malignancy and 3-8 years for invasive FIGO IA tumor revealed no cases of disease recurrence. In the former group, 14 (73 %) women conceived, out of whom 2 miscarried before 22 weeks of gestation, 1 give birth pre-term, i.e. at 34 weeks of gestation, 10 (71.5%) gave birth at term, and 1 is pregnant (6 months) at the time of the publication of the study In the later group, 9 (81.8%) women conceived, out of whom 1 miscarried at 10 weeks of gestation, 1 had a case of intrauterine fetal demise at 27 weeks of gestation, 6 gave birth at term, and 1 is pregnant (3 months) at the time of the publication of the study

CONCLUSIONS

Proper patients selection for fertility-sparing management, as well as the way of performing the surgery allow for adequate control of the malignant process in patients with tumor limited to one ovary and preservation of fertility