title: High levels of cell-free circulating nucleic acids in pancreatic cancer are associated with vascular encasement, metastasis and poor survival.
abstract: Pancreatic cancer is a highly aggressive disease with rapid invasion and early encasement of blood vessels. Hence, levels of circulating nucleic acids and tumor-associated mutations in them may have clinical importance. We analyzed the levels of circulating tumor DNA and oncogenic k-ras mutation in plasma of patients with pancreatic cancer and correlated their levels with survival and clinicopathological parameters. Higher levels of plasma DNA (>62 ng/mL) was found to associate significantly with lower overall survival time (p=.002), presence of vascular encasement (p=.030) and metastasis (p=.001). However, k-ras mutation status did not correlate with any of the clinicopathological parameters or survival. We conclude that circulating DNA in plasma can be an important predictor of prognosis in pancreatic cancer.
authors: Departments of Gastroenterology & Human Nutrition, 1Biostatistics, 2Biochemistry, 3All India Institute of Medical Sciences , New Delhi , India 4.
authors: Nidhi
authors: N
authors: Singh
authors: Surabhi
authors: S
authors: Gupta
authors: R M
authors: RM
authors: Pandey
authors: Shyam S
authors: SS
authors: Chauhan
authors: Anoop
authors: A
authors: Saraya
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009154:Mutation; D009362:Neoplasm Metastasis; D009696:Nucleic Acids / Q000097:blood*; D010190:Pancreatic Neoplasms / Q000097:blood* / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology; D011379:Prognosis; D016019:Survival Analysis
chemical_list: D009696:Nucleic Acids
keywords: Cell-free circulating nucleic acids; Pancreatic cancer; Prognosis