Continuous intravenous infusion of recombinant human endostatin using infusion pump plus chemotherapy in non-small cell lung cancer.

BACKGROUND: Lung cancer is one of the deadliest cancers in the world with the highest incidence and mortality rate among all cancers. Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for approximately 80% of primary lung cancer. However, efficacy and safety of the current regimens for NSCLC is unsatisfactory. Therefore, there has been an increasing urgency for development of potential therapeutic therapies for NSCLC. AIM: To investigate the therapeutic outcomes and safety of continuous intravenous infusion of recombinant human endostatin (Rh-endostain) using an infusion pump in retreated advanced NSCLC. METHODS: Patients with retreated advanced NSCLC who were admitted to Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital from October 2017 to April 2019 were recruited. These patients received continuous intravenous infusion of Rh-endostain using an infusion pump. Objective response rate (ORR), clinical benefit rate (CBR), median progression-free survival (mPFS), and incidences of adverse events (AEs) were analyzed after treatment. RESULTS: A total of 45 patients with retreated advanced NSCLC were included, and all of them were evaluated. In these patients, ORR was 22.2%, CBR was 84.4%, and mPFS was 5.3 mo. The following AEs were observed, decreased hemoglobin (34 cases, 75.6%), nausea/vomiting (32 cases, 71.1%), elevated transaminase (24 cases, 53.3%), leukopenia (16 cases, 35.6%), thrombocytopenia (14 cases, 31.1%), and constipation (1 case, 3.4%). None of the patients had leukopenia, nausea /vomiting, and constipation of grade III and above. CONCLUSION: The patients showed improved adherence to 5-d continuous intravenous infusion of Rh-endostain using an infusion pump. Favorable efficacy and safety of this treatment regimen were achieved in retreated advanced NSCLC.

Lung adenocarcinoma pathology stages related gene identification.

Objective: Lung cancer is a deadly disease with the highest 5-year survival rate. Lung adenocarcinoma is the main subtype of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Correct staging is critical as the basis of treatment. So, the identification of genes associated with pathologic stages of lung adenocarcinoma is helpful in understanding the pathological mechanism and designing targeted therapeutic drugs. Methods: Random forest was suitable for high-dimensional data to identify variables associated with the outcome. The variable importance-based selection method was used to rank the candidate genes associated with pathologic stages of lung adenocarcinoma. Univariate regression was used to analyze the relationship between gene expression and prognosis. The protein-protein interaction network was used to show the interactions among the identified genes. The identified genes functional enrichment analysis was performed by GSEA software. Results: Twelve genes significantly associated with pathologic stages of lung adenocarcinoma were identified by random forest analysis. Eight of these genes were found to play roles in survival of patients with lung adenocarcinoma. Among the 12 genes, 4 genes such as CENPH, SRSF5, PITX2 and NSG1 interacted with each other. And these genes were mainly enriched in p53 signaling pathway, cell cycle signaling pathway, JAK STAT signaling pathway and DNA replication signaling pathway. Conclusion: The identified genes may drive the changes among pathologic stages of lung adenocarcinoma and will be helpful in understanding the molecular changes underlying the pathologic stages.

Decreased expression of Zwint-1 is associated with poor prognosis in hepatocellular carcinoma.

BACKGROUND AND AIM: ZW10 interacting kinetochore protein 1 (Zwint-1), one of the major kinetochore proteins, is essential for kinetochore function, such as spindle assembly checkpoint function and kinetochore-microtubule attachment. Recently, it has been found over-expressed in some human cancers, including ovarian cancer, bladder cancer, and pulmonary adenocarcinoma. However, few studies of the expression of Zwint-1 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) have been reported. This study is aimed to investigate the expression of Zwint-1 and its relationship with clinical pathological characters in HCC. METHODS: The expression of Zwint-1 protein was analyzed by immunohistochemistry staining on tissue microarrays containing 171 HCC tissues and 187 control non-tumorous liver tissues. The relationships between the Zwint-1 expression and the clinicopathological parameters, and survival analysis were investigated using SPSS software 13.0. RESULTS: Zwint-1 was found uniformly expressed in adjacent non-tumorous liver tissues (184/187, 98.40%), while was significantly decreased in HCC tissues, or even absent (150 of 171, 61.82%, P<0.001). The expression of Zwint-1 was negatively associated with age, tumor size, and Edmondson Grade. Besides, HCC patients with low Zwint-1 expression were also correlated with poor overall survival of the patients. CONCLUSIONS: Decreased expression of Zwint-1 was associated with poor prognosis in HCC.