Abstract:
Despite successful surgery, 30-50% of patients with resectable non-small cell lung cancer develop tumor recurrence within 5 years of surgery. In this prospective study, we performed CTC enumerations in 40 patients with non-metastatic lung adenocarcinoma (NMLA) using a size-based microfilter. Additionally, cfDNA isolated from plasma was analyzed in 35 out of 40 patients. CTCs were identified in 15 out of 40 patients (37.5%) with a range of 1-44 cells, whereas mutated cfDNA was only detected in 3 out of 35 patients (8.6%). Disease-free survival (DFS) was significantly associated with CTC positivity (log-rank p=0.025), grading (log-rank p=0.019), tumor stage (log-rank p=0.025) and lymph node status (log-rank p=0.029). Multivariate analysis, including tumor stage and grading, showed that CTC positivity (p=0.006), grading (0.039) and tumor stage (p=0.022) were independently associated with DFS. Our study found that microfilter-based CTC enumeration in NMLA patients is an independent predictor of worse DFS. The used NGS-based cfDNA characterization had limited sensitivity to be clinically informative in our study cohort. CTC assessment before surgery can thus identify NMLA patients at high risk of disease recurrence.
Dandachi, Tiran, Lindenmann, Brcic, Fink-Neuboeck, Kashofer, Absenger, Bezan, (2017). Frequency and clinical impact of preoperative circulating tumor cells in resectable non-metastatic lung adenocarcinomas. Lung cancer (Amsterdam, Netherlands), 2017 Nov;113():152-157. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29110843