Abstract
Background: Oxidative stress plays pivotal roles in the progression of lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) through cell signaling related closely to cancer growth. We previously reported that peroxiredoxin 4 (PRDX4), a secretory-type antioxidant enzyme, can protect against the development of various diseases, including potential malignancies. Since many patients with early-stage LUAD develop recurrence, even after curative complete resection, we investigated the association of the PRDX4 expression with the clinicopathological features and recurrence/prognosis using post-surgical samples of stage I-LUAD. Methods: The expression of PRDX4 and MIB-1, a widely accepted Ki67 protein, was immunohistochemically analysed in 206 paraffin-embedded tumour specimens of patients with stage I-LUAD. The PRDX4 expression was considered to be weak when less than 25% of the adenocarcinoma cells showed positive staining. Results: A weak PRDX4+ expression demonstrated a significantly close relationship with pathologically poor differentiation, highly invasive characteristics and recurrence. The decrease in PRDX4-positivity potentially induced cell growth in LUAD, which was correlated significantly with a very high MIB-1 labelling index (≥17.3%). Univariate/multivariate analyses revealed that the subjects with both weak PRDX4+ expression and a very high MIB-1 index had significantly worse disease-free survival rates than other subjects. Conclusions: The combination of weak PRDX4 expression and a very high MIB-1 index can predict high proliferating activity and recurrence with a potential poor prognosis, especially in post-operative stage I-LUAD patients.