Using genomic strategies to predict non-small-cell lung cancer prognosis

Chen and colleagues developed a 5-gene signature that they found to be closely associated with relapse-free and overall survival among patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

In their study, 185 frozen tissue specimens were randomly assigned to microarray analysis, real-time reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) analysis, or both. Researchers analyzed gene expression in frozen specimens of lung-cancer tissue from 125 patients with NSCLC who had undergone surgical resection, and they studied the relationship between the level of expression and survival. Risk scores and decision-tree analysis were used to develop a gene- expression model for predicting the outcome of treatment.

The authors identified 16 genes that correlated with survival among patients with NSCLC. Five genes (DUSP6, MMD, STAT1, ERBB3, and LCK) were selected for RT-PCR and decision-tree analysis. The 5-gene signature was an independent predictor of relapse-free and overall survival. This model was validated with specimens from an independent cohort of 60 patients with NSCLC and with microarray data from 86 patients with NSCLC.