Significance of survivin mRNA blood levels in patients with melanoma.

PURPOSE: Survivin represents a key anti-apoptotic molecule that is highly expressed in the vast majority of tumors. The aim of the study was to examine the significance of survivin mRNA blood levels in melanoma patients.

METHODS: In this prospective translational research study, survivin mRNA blood levels were measured in melanoma patients treated with adjuvant interferon or systemic treatment for advanced disease.

RESULTS: Sixty-four patients with melanoma and 40 healthy controls were included. The majority of them had tumor stages III and IV. The upper 95% confidence interval (95%CI) of survivin levels in controls was set as normal cut-off. Fifty-two (81.3%) patients had survivin levels above normal cut-off. Melanoma patients had higher survivin levels than controls (p<0.0001). Survivin levels were non-significantly higher in stage III compared to stage IV patients. Patients with survivin levels above vs. below median had median progression-free survival (PFS) 19.5 months vs. 7.4 months (p=0.045), but median overall survival (OS) not reached vs. 18.4 months (p=0.091). Cox proportional hazard models showed that only tumor stage was associated with PFS and OS. There was no statistically significant change in survivin levels between baseline and during treatment (p=0.845) or during follow-up (p=0.101).

CONCLUSION: Although melanoma patients had significantly higher survivin levels than controls, the study showed that survivin mRNA blood levels did not represent an independent prognostic factor for patients with melanoma. The role of circulating survivin should be further examined in larger studies.