Clinical prognostic relevance of growth of human adenocarcinomas of the lung in nude mice.
Forty-nine adenocarcinomas of the lung were transplanted into nude mice in order to examine whether the growth of these tumors or the establishment of tumor lines might be of clinical prognostic value. Twenty-one of the tumors showed growth (= 43%) and 7 (= 14%) could be maintained by serial transplantation. There was no difference in the survival of patients whether their tumors showed growth in the first passage or not. On the other hand, the patients died significantly earlier if a tumor line by serial transplantation could be established (p less than 0.0001). Tumors which could be established had a higher proliferative activity in the primary tumor and in the xenografted tumor in the first passage. Therefore, the establishment of a tumor line might be an additional prognostic indicator for patients with adenocarcinomas of the lung.
German Cancer Research Center, Institute of Experimental Pathology, Heidelberg.
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Volm
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Mattern
D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000473:pathology*; D000818:Animals; D002453:Cell Cycle; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D006801:Humans; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D051379:Mice; D008819:Mice, Nude; D009368:Neoplasm Transplantation; D011379:Prognosis