Tumour necrosis factor-α: prognostic role and relationship with interleukin-8 and endothelin-1 in non-small cell lung cancer
- Authors:
- Published online on: May 1, 2006 https://doi.org/10.3892/ijmm.17.5.887
- Pages: 887-892
Metrics: Total
Views: 0 (Spandidos Publications: | PMC Statistics: )
Total PDF Downloads: 0 (Spandidos Publications: | PMC Statistics: )
Abstract
Cytokines mediate numerous physiological and immune reactions, which are manifested in various biological effects, including tumouricidal activity. We evaluated the expression of the pleiotropic cytokine, tumour necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), by competitive PCR technique in 47 non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cases and the impact of TNF-α on their clinical behaviour. Using univariate analysis, our study demonstrated a positive correlation between high TNF-α expression and favourable prognosis in NSCLC in terms of overall survival and disease free interval (p=0.03 and 0.04, respectively) and TNF-α maintained its independent role in multivariate analysis. TNF-α can stimulate the expression of many molecules, including interleukin-8 (IL-8) and endothelin-1 (ET-1); in our study, the expression of TNF-α was significantly associated with high IL-8 mRNA levels (p=0.008) and ET-1 mRNA positivity (p=0.03). We suggested that TNF-α can induce ET-1 mRNA expression in NSCLC, similarly to IL-8 expression. Our study may also contribute to advancing the knowledge of the molecular relationship between cytokines and endothelial functions in NSCLC.