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Background: CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotypes are associated with poor outcome of triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC); however, the role of the CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype in lymph node metastasis and survival has not been fully understood in TNBC., Methods: A total of 51 TNBC patients were included. CD44 and CD24 expression was determined using immunohistochemistry by which CD44 and CD24 were double-immunostained. Overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) were estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method., Results: The proportion of the CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype was 33.3% in TNBC specimens without lymph node metastases and 69.0% in those with lymph node metastases. In addition, the CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype correlated significantly with tumor size, histologic classification, TNM stage, and lymph node metastasis ( P < 0.05). The CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype was detected in 69.0% of TNBC patients with lymph node metastases, and 51.7% of TNBC patients without lymph node metastases. In TNBC patients without lymph node metastases, the median DFS and OS were 18.2 and 28 months in cases with a CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype and 26.5 and 42.5 months in those without a CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype ( P < 0.05), and in TNBC patients with lymph node metastases, the median DFS and OS were 17.2 and 25.7 months in cases with a CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype and 24.5 and 39.3 months in those without a CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype, respectively ( P < 0.05)., Conclusions: CD44 and CD24 are independent prognostic markers for patients with TNBC. The CD44 + CD24 -/low phenotype correlates with more aggressive clinicopathologic features and is strongly associated with poor prognosis in patients with TNBC., Competing Interests: None., (IJCEP Copyright © 2020.)

The specific mechanism underlying the role of putative stem cell marker aldehyde dehydrogenase 1 (ALDH1) playing in development and progression of breast cancer is currently unclear. Transforming growth factor β (TGFβ) signaling pathway is reported to be activated in most cancers. Thus a study was initiated to explore possible differences and correlation of ALDH1 and TGFβ2 expression in the most common malignant and benign tumors of the breast in Chinese women. Samples of 75 breast cancer tissues, 30 paracancerous normal tissues, and 39 fibroadenoma breast tissues were investigated for the expression of ALDH1 and TGFβ2 using immunohistochemistry. The positive rates of ALDH1 and TGFβ2 protein were 62.67% and 66.67%, respectively, in breast cancer tissues, which were significantly higher than that in normal fibroadenoma breast (P<0.05) and paracancerous tissues (P<0.01). ALDH1 and TGFβ2 status were significantly associated with tumor histological grade and receptor status (P<0.05). Expression of ALDH1 was found to be positively correlative to TGFβ2 in breast cancer (r = 0.33, P<0.01). Expression of both proteins remained significantly associated with reduced overall survival (OS) by univariate analysis (P<0.05). Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that ALDH1 expression, tumor stage, and lymph node status are independent prognostic factors in invasive breast cancer patients. Thus ALDH1 and TGFβ2 play important roles in the development of breast cancer. The ALDH1 phenotype is an independent predictor of poor prognosis, and TGFβ2 signaling pathway activation might be involved in the pathological regulation of ALDH1 in breast cancer.

Purpose: This study aimed to compare the efficacy and toxicity of weekly paclitaxel plus S-1 with weekly paclitaxel plus 5-fluorouracil in treating advanced gastric cancer as first line regimen. The primary end-point was disease control rate (DCR)., Methods: Patients with advanced or recurrent gastric cancer were randomly assigned to an experimental arm or a control arm. The experimental arm's dosage schedule was paclitaxel 60 mg/m2 (intravenous infusion) on days 1, 8 and 15 and S-1 80-120 mg/d (oral administration) on days 1-14. Control arm patients were given the same paclitaxel, combined with 5-fluorouracil 500 mg/m2 (continuous intravenous infusion) on days 1-5; and leucovorin 20 mg/m2 (intravenous infusion) on days 1-5. All schedules were repeated every 28 d., Results: A total of 240 patients were enrolled and equally randomised into two arms. The overall response rate and DCR of the experimental arm was non-inferior to that of the control arm both in the per-protocol set and the full analysis set. The secondary end-point median progression-free survival (PFS) of the experimental and control arms was 153 and 129 d, with the hazard ratio of 0.641 (95% CI: 0.473-0.868, P = 0.004). The hazard ratio of the time to treatment failure of the two arms was 1.449 (95% CI: 0.705-2.980, P = 0.229). The six-month PFS rates of both arms were similar (31.3% versus 31.8%, P = 0.94). Cox regression analysis indicated that only treatment regimen and age were independent predictive factors for PFS. The most common adverse events were haematological and gastrointestinal. The rates of grade 3-4 adverse events were not significantly different between the two study arms and were mostly lower than 5%., Conclusion: Weekly paclitaxel combined with S-1 is an active and well-tolerated regimen, supporting the view that S-1 can be an alternative for infusional 5-fluorouracil for advanced gastric cancer., (Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background and Objective: Due to the various inter-individual differences in the biological characteristics of tumor cells, as well as issues on the efficacy, adverse reactions, and defects of existing drugs, we compared the clinical efficacy and toxicity of pemetrexed and gemcitabine combined with cisplatin for the treatment of previously untreated advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC)., Methods: 251 patients were randomly divided into pemetrexed combined with cisplatin group (PP group) with 127 cases and gemcitabine combined with cisplatin group (GP group) with 124 cases. PP group received pemetrexed 500 mg/m² iv infusion d1 and cisplatin 75 mg/m² iv infusion d1, whereas GP group received gemcitabine 1,000 mg/m² iv infusion d1,8 and cisplatin 75 mg/m² iv infusion d1. The treatment cycle was once every three weeks. In addition, folic acid, vitamin B12, and dexamethasone were administered in both groups., Results: The total clinical effective rates in PP group and GP group were 25.20% and 17.74%, respectively. The total efficiencies of non-squamous cell carcinoma were 27.62% and 16.00%. The tumor progression duration in these two groups was 6.5 and 5.6 months, respectively. The median survival time in the two groups was 16.9 and 17.0 months, respectively, with 59.62% and 65.87% survival rates of 1 year and 27.28% and 27.93% survival rates of 2 years, respectively. The total efficacy of non-squamous cell carcinoma in the PP group was significantly higher than that in GP group. The results were statistically significant. However, there were no significant differences in total response rates, tumor progression duration, and median survival rates of 1 and 2 years. The rate of adverse reactions, including white blood cell reduction, lower platelet count, lower hemoglobin, and hair loss in the PP group was significantly lower than that in the GP group. The results were statistically significant., Conclusion: The clinical efficacy of pemetrexed and gemcitabine combined with cisplatin for the treatment of previously untreated advanced NSCLC was roughly the same, but the adverse reactions decreased significantly in the PP group compared with those in the GP group. Therefore, pemetrexed combined with cisplatin can be used as a safe and effective drug for clinical first-line treatment for previously untreated NSCLC.

Background: To evaluate and compare the effects and toxicity of the domestic product of recombinant mutant human tumor necrosis factor (rmhTNF) combined with chemotherapy and chemotherapy alone in the treatment of patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC)., Methods: Two hundred patients with NSCLC in multicenter were randomly devided into trial group (150 cases) and control group (50 cases). Chemotherapy with CAP regimen was given to the patients. Meanwhile, rmhTNF injection of 4×10⁶U/m² was also given from the 1st to 7th days, the 11th to 17th days on the chemotherapy cycle in the trial group. The control patients received chemotherapy alone. Twenty-one days were as a cycle, 2 cycles were given to each patient. The chemotherapeutic effects and toxicity were observed and compared between the two groups after the therapy., Results: of the 200 patients, 5 cases in the trial group and 3 cases in the control group were out of the trial because of economy. The other 192 cases (145 cases in the trial group and 47 cases in the control group) could be analyzed and evaluated the clinical effects and toxicity. The response rate of chemotherapy was 46.90% (68/145) in the trial group and 17.02% (8/47) in the control group respectively ( P =0.001). The KPS scores was 86.02±9.74 in the trial group, and 80.14±9.10 in the control group ( P =0.025). No significant difference of degree III+IV toxicity was observed between the two groups ( P > 0.05). The side effects related to rmhTNF included slight fever, cold-like symptoms, pain and red and swelling in the injection site. All of them were mild and didn't need any treatment and disappeared after the therapy. There were no severe abnormality of liver and kidney function and ECG in both groups., Conclusions: The results demonstrate that the effects of domestic rmhTNF combined with chemotherapy are remarkably higher than that of chemotherapy alone in the treatment of NSCLC. rmhTNF can increase the sensitivity to chemotherapy and improve the quality of life of the patients with slight toxicity. Hence rmhTNF is worth expanding clinical use.