Low protein expression of MET in ER-positive and HER2-positive breast cancer

The mesenchymal-epithelial transition factor (MET) is a receptor tyrosine kinase that plays a key role in cell survival, growth, angiogenesis and metastasis. Because its expression is frequently altered in tumors, MET is currently under investigation as a potential target for anticancer therapy. The...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Anticancer research 2014-03, Vol.34 (3), p.1227-1231
Main Authors: Zagouri, Flora, Brandstetter, Anita, Moussiolis, Dimitrios, Chrysikos, Dimosthenis, Dimitrakakis, Constantine, Tsigginou, Alexandra, Marinopoulos, Spyros, Zografos, George C, Sergentanis, Theodoros N, Dimopoulos, Meletios-Athanassios, Filipits, Martin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Biomarkers, Tumor - metabolism
Breast Neoplasms - metabolism
Breast Neoplasms - pathology
Carcinoma, Ductal, Breast - metabolism
Carcinoma, Ductal, Breast - pathology
Carcinoma, Lobular - metabolism
Carcinoma, Lobular - pathology
Female
Follow-Up Studies
Humans
Immunoenzyme Techniques
Middle Aged
Neoplasm Grading
Neoplasm Staging
Prognosis
Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-met - metabolism
Receptor, ErbB-2 - metabolism
Receptors, Estrogen - metabolism
Receptors, Progesterone - metabolism
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Summary:The mesenchymal-epithelial transition factor (MET) is a receptor tyrosine kinase that plays a key role in cell survival, growth, angiogenesis and metastasis. Because its expression is frequently altered in tumors, MET is currently under investigation as a potential target for anticancer therapy. The purpose of the present study was to determine the prognostic value of tumor MET expression levels in patients with estrogen receptor (ER)-positive and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive breast cancer, in order to strengthen the rationale for targeted therapy using MET inhibitors in this breast cancer subpopulation. We determined the expression of MET in formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded surgical specimens of ER- and HER2-positive breast cancer by immunohistochemistry. Comparisons of MET expression with clinical parameters, including survival of the patients, were performed with MET expression as a dichotomized variable classified as high or low. Out of 78 tumors, 3 (3.8%) showed high MET expression. The analysis examining the association between MET and survival did not yield any statistically significant result regarding overall survival or disease-free survival. ER- and HER2-positive breast carcinomas do not exhibit high MET expression. This null finding, the first to be reported in the literature, is of great importance, since it indicates that this sub-group population is not proper candidate for clinical trials with MET inhibitors.
ISSN:1791-7530