title: Clinical study of disseminated tumor cells in bone marrow of patients with gastric cancer.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Tumor micrometastasis usually occurs at early stage. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the morphology of disseminated tumor cells (DTCs) and its clinical significance in bone marrow (BM) of patients with gastric cancer.
  
  
  METHODS
  Forty patients with gastric cancer were enrolled and mononuclear cells were separated from BMs. After labeled by MACS microbeads conjugated with human epithelial antigen (HEA) antibodies, tumor cells were viably enriched twice by MS+/RS+ positive separation column. Parts of the cells from the patients were stained with CK-FITC, DAPI and EB. Then, morphology of the stained tumor cells was observed under fluorescence microscope.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Six hundred and eighty eight CK positive cells in 18 cases (45%) were detected, including 384 (55.8%) medium-sized cells, 102 (14.8%) large-sized cells, 46(6.7%) stem-cell-like cells, 8 (1.2%) M-phase cells, 84 (12.2%) nuclear debris and 64 (9.3%) non-nuclear debris. The number of tumor cells in BM was significantly correlated with TNM stage (p=0.038), but not with gender, age, histological differentiation and lymph node metastasis.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The DTCs in BM of patients with gastric cancer show various morphological characteristics. The existence of these tumor cells suggests a poor prognosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Fourth Hospital of Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, China.
authors.forename: Guiying
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Shijie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Yueming
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.forename: Zhenchuan
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Song
authors.forename: Qun
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Ziqiang
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Tian
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001853:Bone Marrow / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007633:Keratins / Q000032:analysis; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011379:Prognosis; D013274:Stomach Neoplasms / Q000737:chemistry / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology*
chemical_list: D007633:Keratins