Pair Box 8 (PAX8) protein expression in high grade, late stage (stages III and IV) ovarian serous carcinoma.
OBJECTIVE
Pair-Box 8 (PAX8) is a transcription factor which has been found to be overexpressed in ovarian serous carcinoma (OSC). Silencing PAX8 by using shRNA led to a drop in cell viability in ovarian cancer cell lines, suggesting its use as a targeted therapeutic agent. The prognostic value of PAX8 in OSC is still widely unknown. The aim of this study was to evaluate PAX8 as a prognostic biomarker in patients with advanced stage OSC.


METHODS
PAX8 was evaluated using immunohistochemistry on a tissue microarray of 148 OSC and the expression was correlated to the following clinico-pathologic variables; age of diagnosis, tumor stage, optimal debulking, recurrence free survival (RFS) and overall survival (OS).


RESULTS
We found that PAX8 was expressed in 61% of cases. There was no association between PAX8 and tumor stage, optimal debulking and disease recurrence. In addition, PAX8 failed to have a predictive value in disease outcome.


CONCLUSIONS
Despite showing that PAX8 protein is not a useful predictive marker in patients with high grade, advanced stage OSC, its overexpression in a large number of these cases makes the inhibition of PAX8 a very attractive targeted therapy.
Department of Pathology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90033-5000, USA. pfauceglia@hotmail.com
Paulette
P
Mhawech-Fauceglia
Dan
D
Wang
Damanzoopinder
D
Samrao
Heidi
H
Godoy
Faith
F
Ough
Song
S
Liu
Tanja
T
Pejovic
Shashikant
S
Lele
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000096:biosynthesis* / Q000235:genetics; D000077216:Carcinoma, Ovarian Epithelial; D018284:Cystadenocarcinoma, Serous / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D008875:Middle Aged; D009364:Neoplasm Recurrence, Local / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D009375:Neoplasms, Glandular and Epithelial / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery; D010051:Ovarian Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery; D000072636:PAX8 Transcription Factor; D051761:Paired Box Transcription Factors / Q000096:biosynthesis* / Q000235:genetics
D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D000072636:PAX8 Transcription Factor; C083325:PAX8 protein, human; D051761:Paired Box Transcription Factors