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Human kallikrein 8 predicts a favorable outcome in ovarian cancer

Megan Rauscher

Last Updated: 2004-03-30 12:40:47 -0400 (Reuters Health)

ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters Health) - The serine protease human kallikrein 8 (hK8) is an independent marker of a favorable prognosis in women with ovarian cancer, according to the results of a study presented here at the 95th annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research.

"With further study, quantifying the levels of hK8 in biopsy tissue may be worthwhile in women with ovarian cancer," study presenter Carla A. Borgono, a PhD candidate at the University of Toronto in Ontario, told Reuters Health.

Previously, researchers showed that the hK8 protein is increased in 55% of ovarian tumor tissues and 62% of sera from ovarian cancer patients compared to healthy controls, suggesting that hK8 is a prospective diagnostic ovarian cancer biomarker. (see Reuters Health report June 30, 2003).

In the current study, the researchers used an hK8-specific ELISA they developed to study the prognostic significance of this protein in 136 ovarian tumor extracts by correlating hK8 levels with various clinicopathological variables and outcome over a median of 42 months. According to the researchers, 25.7% of tumors were hK8-positive, defined as a level of 25.8 ng/mg total protein or greater.

Compared with women with hK8-negative tumors (< 25.8 ng/mg), women with hK8-positive tumors most often had lower grade tumors, no residual tumor after surgery, and "optimal debulking success" (p < 0.05).

Women with hK8-positive tumors also had a significantly longer progression-free survival and overall survival than those with hK8-negative tumors (p < 0.05). Kaplan-Meier survival curves further confirmed a lower risk of relapse and death in women with hK8-positive tumors (p = 0.001 and p = 0.014, respectively).

"Similar findings have been seen with several other kallikrein proteins as well," Borgono told Reuters Health. "We are looking in the future to develop panels of biomarkers. For example, we could combine all of the kallikreins into a panel and see if together they could predict the prognosis of a patient," she said.

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