title: Ectopic expression of RASSF2 and its prognostic role for gastric adenocarcinoma patients.
abstract: RASSF2 has recently been identified as a potential tumor suppressor that serves as a Ras effector in various types of human cancers. However, there have been few reports detailing this in gastric cancer. Samples of gastric adenocarcinoma from 276 Chinese patients with follow-up were analyzed for RASSF2 protein expression by immunohistochemistry. RASSF2 was expressed in up to 31.2% (86/276) of this group of gastric carcinoma. The expression of RASSF2 was significantly lower in carcinomas than in normal mucosas (P<0.05). RASSF2 corresponded positively with patient age, histological differentiation, depth of tumor invasion, regional lymph node and distant metastasis, and TNM stage (all P<0.05). Further multivariate analysis revealed that patient gender, depth of tumor invasion, distant metastasis, TNM stage and the expression of RASSF2 were independent prognostic factors for patients with gastric cancer. The Kaplan-Meier plot showed that the overall mean survival time of the patients with RASSF2-negative expression was shorter than that of patients with positive expression (χ(2)=156.874, P<0.0001). Moreover, RASSF2-negative expression had a much more significant effect on the survival of those patients with early stage tumors (χ(2)=127.167, P<0.0001), highlighted by a >50.9% reduction in 3-year survival compared to that of patients with RASSF2-positive expression. In late stages, the difference was also significant (χ(2)=6.246, P=0.019), with a 35.5% reduction in 3-year survival. It is suggested that RASSF2 plays an important role in the evolution of gastric adenocarcinoma and should be considered as a potential marker for its prognosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Gastroenterology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University;
authors.forename: Deng
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Luo
authors.forename: Ting
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ye
authors.forename: Tian-Qian
authors.initials: TQ
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Peng
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Tang
authors.forename: Sha-Dong
authors.initials: SD
authors.lastname: Min
authors.forename: Gong-Fang
authors.initials: GF
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Hua
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Jiang
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.forename: Yan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Lin
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Lv
authors.forename: Ming-Liang
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.forename: Meng-Yao
authors.initials: MY
authors.lastname: Zheng