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Review
. 2024 Feb 13;2(1):13.
doi: 10.1038/s44276-024-00043-z.

Protein prognostic biomarkers in stage II colorectal cancer: implications for post-operative management

Aziz A A Alnakli  1 , Abidali Mohamedali  1   2 , Benjamin Heng  1 , Charles Chan  3   4 , Joo-Shik Shin  5 , Michael Solomon  6 , Pierre Chapuis  4 , Gilles J Guillemin  7 , Mark S Baker  1 , Seong Beom Ahn  8
Affiliations
Review

Protein prognostic biomarkers in stage II colorectal cancer: implications for post-operative management

Aziz A A Alnakli et al. BJC Rep. .

Abstract

Colorectal cancer (CRC) poses a significant threat to many human lives worldwide and survival following resection is predominantly stage dependent. For early-stage cancer, patients are not routinely advised to undergo additional post-operative adjuvant chemotherapy. Acceptable clinical management guidelines are well established for patients in pTNM stages I, III and IV. However, recommendations for managing CRC stage II patients remain controversial and many studies have been conducted to segregate stage II patients into low- and high-risk of recurrence using genomic, transcriptomic and proteomic molecular markers. As proteins provide valuable insights into cellular functions and disease state and have a relatively easy translation to the clinic, this review aims to discuss potential prognostic protein biomarkers proposed for predicting tumour relapse in early-stage II CRC. It is suggested that a panel of markers may be more effective than a single marker and further evaluation is required to translate these into clinical practice.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1. Histopathological features of CRC-II substages according to the TNM staging system.
The figure shows CRC-II substages along with corresponding histopathology and relative overall survival (OS) according to each substage as per the 8th edition of the AJCC staging manual [4]. For comparison purposes, stage I and stage IIIA are also included. Histologically, a tumour is still confined to the colorectal wall in the early stages of CRC (CRC-I and CRC-II) while spreading to the adjacent lymph nodes in stage III. In stage I (T2N0), a tumour has only invaded the muscle. In CRC-IIA (T3N0), a tumour extends only to the serosa while penetrating the serosa in stage CRC-IIB (T4aN0). Stage CRC-IIC (T4bN0) is when a tumour reaches the neighbouring tissues. Stage CRC-IIIA (T1/2N1) is when a tumour is found in 1 to 3 lymph nodes. Notably, relative OS in CRC-IIIA is superior (90.7%) to stage CRC-IIC (58.4%) [4].
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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