Blood-borne cancer cells--quo vadis?
The detection of blood-borne cancer cells may help in clinical staging and further understanding of cancer metastasis. We developed a cytokeratin-based immunomagnetic method to isolate epithelium-derived cells from the circulating blood of patients. The number of cell clusters positive for cytokeratin/prostate-specific antigen (PSA) from the peripheral blood of prostate cancer patients and cytokeratin/p185c-erbB-2 from the peripheral blood of breast cancer patients has been related to stage of the disease. Breast cancer patients who presented cytokeratin/p185c-erbB-2-positive cell clusters showed a decrease in such cells under adriamycin adjuvant therapy with Further molecular characterization by a highly sensitive microsatellite multiplex-PCR enabled reproducible detection of microsatellite alterations. The impact of these individually targeted results may contribute to an individual diagnostic and therapeutic strategy.
Brandt
B
B
Institute of Clinical Chemistry, University of Münster, Germany. brandt@uni-muenster.de
Schmitt
H
H
Feldner
J C
JC
Lellé
R J
RJ
Semjonow
A
A
Beckmann
A
A
D015415:Biomarkers / Q000097:blood; D004847:Epithelial Cells / Q000166:cytology / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D007633:Keratins / Q000032:analysis / Q000097:blood; D009362:Neoplasm Metastasis; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000097:blood* / Q000473:pathology*
D015415:Biomarkers; D007633:Keratins