Lower blood calcium associates with unfavorable prognosis and predicts for bone metastasis in NSCLC

• Published in: PloS one 2012-03, Vol.7 (3), p.e34264-e34264
• Main Authors: Shen, Hongchang, Li, Yongqiu, Liao, Yida, Zhang, Tiehong, Liu, Qi, Du, Jiajun
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Aged; Analysis; Angiogenesis; Apoptosis; Biology; Biomarkers; Blood; Blood levels; Bone Neoplasms - blood; Bone Neoplasms - mortality; Bone Neoplasms - secondary; Breast cancer; Calcium; Calcium - blood; Calcium homeostasis; Cancer metastasis; Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung - blood; Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung - mortality; Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung - pathology; Cell cycle; Cell growth; Clinical trials; Dairy products; Development and progression; Electrolytes; Electrolytes - metabolism; Female; Health risk assessment; Homeostasis; Hospitals; Humans; Hypotheses; Lung cancer; Lung carcinoma; Lung diseases; Lung Neoplasms - blood; Lung Neoplasms - mortality; Lung Neoplasms - pathology; Lymph nodes; Lymphatic system; Male; Mathematics; Medical prognosis; Medical screening; Medicine; Metastases; Metastasis; Middle Aged; Models, Biological; Multivariate Analysis; Neoplasm Metastasis - diagnosis; Non-small cell lung cancer; Non-small cell lung carcinoma; Odds Ratio; Oncology; Ovarian cancer; Patients; Prognosis; Proportional Hazards Models; Prostate cancer; Regression analysis; Regression models; Risk analysis; Risk Factors; Signal processing; Squamous cell carcinoma; Studies; Survival; Survival analysis; Thoracic surgery; Tumorigenesis; Tumors
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0034264

Ionized calcium was involved in various cellular signal pathways,and regulates many cellular processes, including those relevant to tumorigenesis. We hypothesis that imbalance of calcium homeostasis is correlated with development of lung carcinomas. We collected the clinical data of 1084 patients with non small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated in Shandong Provincial Hospital, Shandong University. Logistic regression was used to determine the association between calcium levels and clinical characteristics, and COX regression and Kaplan-Meier model were applied to analyze risk factors on overall survival. Blood electrolytes were tested before treatment; and nearly 16% patients with NSCLC were complained with decreased blood calcium, which is more frequent than that in other electrolytes. Further, Multivariate logistic regression analysis disclosed that there were significant correlation between blood calcium decrease and moderate and poor differentiation (P = 0.012, OR = 1.926 (1.203-4.219)), squamous cell carcinoma (P = 0.024, OR = 1.968(1.094-3.540)), and bone metastasis (P = 0.032, OR = 0.396(0.235-0.669)). In multivariate COX regression analysis, advanced lymph node stage and decreased blood calcium were significantly and independent, unfavorable prognostic factors (P