Stathmin Overexpression Identifies High-Risk Patients and Lymph Node Metastasis in Endometrial Cancer

Abstract

Purpose: Overexpression of the oncogen Stathmin has been linked to aggressive endometrial carcinoma and a potential for PI3Kinase inhibitors in this disease. We wanted to validate the prognostic value of Stathmin expression in a large prospective multicenter setting. As lymph node sampling is part of current surgical staging, we also aimed to test if Stathmin expression in endometrial curettage specimens could predict lymph node metastasis.Experimental Design: A total of 1,076 endometrial cancer patients have been recruited from 10 centers to investigate the biological tumor marker Stathmin in relation to clinicopathologic variables, including lymph node status and survival. Stathmin immunohistochemical staining was carried out in 477 hysterectomy and 818 curettage specimens.Results: Seventy-one percent of the patients (n ¼ 763) were subjected to lymph node sampling, of which 12% had metastatic nodes (n ¼ 94). Overexpression of Stathmin was detected in 37% (302 of 818) of the curettage and in 18% (84 of 477) of the hysterectomy specimens investigated. Stathmin overexpression in curettage and hysterectomy specimens were highly correlated and significantly associated with nonendometrioid histology, high grade, and aneuploidy. Stathmin analysis in preoperative curettage samples significantly correlated with, and was an independent predictor of, lymph node metastases. High Stathmin expression was associated with poor disease-specific survival (P 0.002) both in curettage and hysterectomy specimens.Conclusions: Stathmin immunohistochemical staining identifies endometrial carcinomas with lymph node metastases and poor survival. The value, as a predictive marker for response to PI3Kinase inhibition and as a tool to stratify patients for lymph node sampling in endometrial carcinomas, remains to be determined. Clin Cancer Res; 17(10); 3368-77. Ó2011 AACR.

ARID1A loss is prevalent in endometrial hyperplasia with atypia and low-grade endometrioid carcinomas

“…In total, 641 patients with endometrial cancer were consecutively and prospectively included in our database from May 2001 to November 2011 and treated at the department of gynecology and obstetrics, Haukeland University Hospital, Bergen, Norway. Clinicopathological data including age at diagnosis, FIGO 2009 stage, 15 histological subtype, grade and treatment were recorded as previously reported 16 and formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tumor tissue was collected from all patients. Patients were routinely subjected to hysterectomy and bilateral salpingooophorectomy after obtaining a histological diagnosis of endometrial cancer, unless surgery was contra-indicated due to severe co-morbidity.…”

Stathmin 1: a protein with many tasks. New biomarker and potential target in cancer

“…Moreover, upregulated stathmin has been shown to be extensively correlated with poor survival. In one particular analysis involving 1,076 endometrial cancer specimens, stathmin overexpression was significantly associated with poor survival of the patients and with nodal metastasis [18].…”

Elevated Plasma Growth Differentiation Factor-15 Correlates with Lymph Node Metastases and Poor Survival in Endometrial Cancer

“…The incidence of endometrial cancer is increasing worldwide. Several biomarkers have shown associations with clinical characteristics and prognosis in endometrial cancer (1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6), but currently none are implemented in routine clinical practice. There is a need for identification of new biomarkers improving our understanding, diagnosis, and follow-up of endometrial cancer (7).…”