Expression of MAC30 protein is related to survival and clinicopathological variables in breast cancer.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: MAC30 is a protein with unknown function that is differentially expressed in certain malignancies. The aims of this study were to evaluate the relationship between MAC30 expression and clinicopathologic features while investigate the prognostic value of MAC30 expression in breast cancer.

METHODS: Immunohistochemistry was used to examine MAC30 expression in 243 breast cancer tissues, meanwhile in 59 matched adjacent noncancerous tissues and 46 benign breast tumor tissues as controls. The correlation of MAC30 expression with clinicopathological parameters was assessed using χ(2) analysis. The Kaplan-Meier method and Cox proportional hazards model were used to predict factors with a significant independent prognostic value.

RESULTS: MAC30 was overexpressed in breast cancer compared with matched adjacent noncancerous tissues and benign breast tumor (both P < 0.001). Moreover, MAC30 expression was correlated with tumor size, TNM stage, lymph node metastasis, and recurrence. Furthermore, it was shown that patients with high MAC30 expression had significantly poorer overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS; P = 0.002 and P = 0.007, respectively). Multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed that high MAC30 expression was an independent prognostic factor for both OS and DFS (P = 0.018 and P = 0.044, respectively).

CONCLUSIONS: Overexpression of MAC30 was associated with tumor progression, recurrence, and poor survival in breast cancer. Testing expression of MAC30 will be helpful for predicting prognosis in breast cancer.