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Review
. 2023 Jan 26;15(3):767.
doi: 10.3390/cancers15030767.

Tumor Infiltrating Lymphocytes across Breast Cancer Subtypes: Current Issues for Biomarker Assessment

Carmine Valenza  1   2 , Beatrice Taurelli Salimbeni  1   3 , Celeste Santoro  1   2 , Dario Trapani  1   2 , Gabriele Antonarelli  1   2 , Giuseppe Curigliano  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Tumor Infiltrating Lymphocytes across Breast Cancer Subtypes: Current Issues for Biomarker Assessment

Carmine Valenza et al. Cancers (Basel). .

Abstract

Tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) represent a surrogate biomarker of anti-tumor, lymphocyte-mediated immunity. In early, triple-negative breast cancer, TILs have level 1B of evidence to predict clinical outcomes. TILs represent a promising biomarker to select patients who can experience a better prognosis with de-intensified cancer treatments and derive larger benefits from immune checkpoint inhibitors. However, the assessment and the validation of TILs as a biomarker require a prospective and rigorous demonstration of its clinical validity and utility, provided reproducible analytical performance. With pending data about the prospective validation of TILs' clinical validity to modulate treatments in early breast cancer, this review summarizes the most important current issues and future challenges related to the implementation of TILs assessments across all breast cancer subtypes and their potential integration into clinical practice.

Keywords: biomarker; breast cancer; breast cancer subtypes; immune checkpoint inhibitors; triple negative breast cancer; tumor infiltrating lymphocytes; tumor microenvironment.

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Conflict of interest statement

GC received honoraria for speaker’s engagement: Roche, Seattle Genetics, Novartis, Lilly, Pfizer, Foundation Medicine, NanoString, Samsung, Celltrion, BMS, MSD; honoraria for providing consultancy: Roche, Seattle Genetics, NanoString; honoraria for participating in an advisory board: Roche, Lilly, Pfizer, Foundation Medicine, Samsung, Celltrion, Mylan; honoraria for writing engagement: Novartis, BMS; honoraria for participation in the Ellipsis Scientific Affairs Group; and Institutional research funding for conducting phase I and II clinical trials: Pfizer, Roche, Novartis, Sanofi, Celgene, Servier, Orion, AstraZeneca, Seattle Genetics, AbbVie, Tesaro, BMS, Merck Serono, Merck Sharp Dome, Janssen-Cilag, Philogen, Bayer, Medivation, and Medimmune. Other authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Current issues for the assessment of the analytical validity, clinical validity, and clinical utility of TILs in BC. Keys: BC, breast cancer; HER2, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2; HR, hormone receptor; ICIs, immune checkpoint inhibitors; TILs, tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes; TME, tumor microenvironment. Created with BioRender.com (accessed on 20 October 2022).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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