title: Interferon-gamma polymorphisms correlate with duration of survival in pancreatic cancer.
abstract: Despite progress in diagnosis and staging, pancreatic cancer still has a poor prognosis and it remains difficult to predict duration of survival in advanced pancreatic cancer. Nutritional decline, or cachexia, is a contributory factor to decreased survival in advanced pancreatic carcinoma, and it has been demonstrated that proinflammatory cytokines give rise to cachexia. Interferon (IFN)-gamma is a proinflammatory cytokine whose administration increases survival outcomes in a variety of cancers. The human IFN-gamma gene has a variable length CA-repeat sequence, the length that has been shown to influence IFN-gamma production. The current study was performed to ascertain whether polymorphisms of the IFN-gamma gene would influence survival of individuals with advanced pancreatic cancer. The study demonstrated that the presence of allele 2 (12 CA repeats) was consistently associated with increased duration of survival after confirmation of nonresectable pancreatic carcinoma. We therefore propose that the presence of allele 2 may be a useful marker for patient outcome.
authors.affiliation: Tissue Injury and Repair Group, Centre for Inflammation Research, College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine, University of Edinburgh, Teviot Place, Edinburgh, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: M A T
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Halma
authors.forename: N M
authors.initials: NM
authors.lastname: Wheelhouse
authors.forename: M D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Barber
authors.forename: J J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Powell
authors.forename: K C H
authors.initials: KC
authors.lastname: Fearon
authors.forename: J A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Ross
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D018900:Dinucleotide Repeats / Q000235:genetics; D005260:Female; D005838:Genotype; D006801:Humans; D007371:Interferon-gamma / Q000235:genetics*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010190:Pancreatic Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology*; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic / Q000235:genetics*; D011379:Prognosis; D016019:Survival Analysis
chemical_list: D007371:Interferon-gamma