title: Emerging molecular markers for the prognosis of differentiated thyroid cancer patients.
abstract: Epithelial thyroid cancers are represented by the differentiated papillary and follicular thyroid carcinomas which, following dedifferentiation, are thought to give rise to the highly aggressive and incurable anaplastic thyroid carcinomas. Although derived from the same cell type, the different thyroid tumors show specific histological features, biological behavior and degree of differentiation as a consequence of different genetic alterations. Over the last few years, our knowledge regarding the molecular alterations underlying thyroid cell malignant transformation and cancer progression has considerably increased; however, the prognosis of differentiated thyroid cancer patients still relies on high-risk clinic-pathological variables. In particular, the actual staging systems provides only a rough prediction for cancer mortality and risk of recurrences, including in each risk group patients with highly different tumor-specific progression, disease-free interval and survival time. In order to improve DTC patient's risk stratification, both the European and the American Thyroid Associations proposed practical guidelines to integrate the actual staging systems with additional clinical features such as the tumor histological variant, the results of post-ablative whole body scan and the serum thyroglobulin levels. Despite that, patients within the same risk group still show a very heterogeneous behavior in terms of disease-free interval. As a consequence, the identification of new prognostic molecular biomarkers able to testify tumor aggressiveness is highly required. Here we'll review recently characterized new molecular markers potentially able to ameliorate the prognosis in DTC patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 324, 00161 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Enke
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Baldini
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgical Sciences, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Salvatore
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sorrenti
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 324, 00161 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Chiara
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Tuccilli
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 324, 00161 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Natalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Prinzi
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 324, 00161 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Carmela
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Coccaro
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgical Sciences, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Catania
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgical Sciences, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Angelo
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Filippini
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery "Pietro Valdoni", "Sapienza" University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bononi
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgical Sciences, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Enrico
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: De Antoni
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 324, 00161 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Massimino
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: D'Armiento
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 324, 00161 Rome, Italy. Electronic address: salvatore.ulisse@uniroma1.it.
authors.forename: Salvatore
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ulisse
mesh_terms: D018263:Adenocarcinoma, Follicular / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000378:metabolism; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000378:metabolism*; D002277:Carcinoma / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000378:metabolism; D002291:Carcinoma, Papillary; D006801:Humans; D011379:Prognosis; D000077273:Thyroid Cancer, Papillary; D013964:Thyroid Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor
keywords: BRAF; Estrogen receptor; Prognosis; TNM; Thyroid cancer; Urokinase plasminogen activating system; miRNA