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. 2021 Mar;32(2):e18.
doi: 10.3802/jgo.2021.32.e18. Epub 2020 Dec 3.

Ovarian cancer risk score predicts chemo-response and outcome in epithelial ovarian carcinoma patients

Hsiao Yun Lu  1   2 , Yi Jou Tai  2   3 , Yu Li Chen  2 , Ying Cheng Chiang  2   4 , Heng Cheng Hsu  2   5 , Wen Fang Cheng  2   3   6
Affiliations

Ovarian cancer risk score predicts chemo-response and outcome in epithelial ovarian carcinoma patients

Hsiao Yun Lu et al. J Gynecol Oncol. 2021 Mar.

Abstract

Objective: Cytoreductive surgery followed by adjuvant chemotherapy is a standard frontline treatment for epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). We aimed to develop an ovarian cancer risk score (OVRS) based on the expression of 10 ovarian-cancer-related genes to predict the chemoresistance, and outcomes of EOC patients.

Methods: We designed a case-control study with total 149 EOC women including 75 chemosensitives and 74 chemoresistants. Gene expression was measured using the quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. We tested for correlation between the OVRS and chemosensitivity or chemoresistance, disease-free survival (DFS), and overall survival (OS), and validated the OVRS by analyzing patients from the TCGA database.

Results: The chemosensitive group had lower OVRS than the chemoresistant group (5 vs. 15, p≤0.001, Mann-Whitney U test). Patients with disease relapse (13 vs. 5, p<0.001, Mann-Whitney U test) or disease-related death (13.5 vs. 6, p<0.001) had higher OVRS than those without. OVRS ≥10 (hazard ratio=3.29; 95% confidence interval=1.94-5.58; p<0.001) was the only predictor for chemoresistance in multivariate analysis. The median DFS (5 months vs. 24 months) and OS (39 months vs. >60 months) of patients with OVRS ≥10 were significantly shorter than those of patients with OVRS <10). The high OVRS group also had significantly shorter median OS than the low OVRS group in 255 patients in the TCGA database (39 vs. 49 months, p=0.046).

Conclusions: Specific genes panel can be clinically applied in predicting the chemoresistance and outcome, and decision-making of epithelial ovarian cancer.

Keywords: Drug Resistance; Gene Analysis; Ovarian Cancer; Prognostic Factor; Risk Score.

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Conflict of interest statement

No potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was reported.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1. (A) Distribution of OVRS of 149 epithelial ovarian carcinoma patients in different conditions. (A) Chemosensitivity and chemoresistance. (B) Disease relapse. (C) Disease-related death.
OVRS, ovarian cancer risk score.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2. The receiver operating characteristic curves of 149 epithelial ovarian carcinoma patients using ovarian cancer risk score=8.5 in different condition. (A) Chemoresistance. (B) Disease relapse. (C) Disease-related death.
AUROC, area under the receiver operating characteristic curve.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3. (A) The DFS curves of 149 EOC patients with low and high OVRS. (B) The OS curves of 149 EOC patients with low and high OVRS groups. (The cutoff score of OVRS was 10).
AUROC, area under the receiver operating characteristic curve; DFS, disease-free survival; EOC, epithelial ovarian cancer; OS, overall survival; OVRS, ovarian cancer risk score.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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