Clinical Significance of Circulating Serum Cellular Heat Shock Protein 90 (HSP90) Level in Patients with Cutaneous Malignant Melanoma

Abstract

<br /> <strong><span style="font-size: small;">Background: </span></strong><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">Cellular heat shock proteins (HSPs) play significant roles in sustaining normal cellular conditions. </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">The stimulated expressions of HSPs result in cellular stabilization at times of stress, such as cancer. The objective of </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">this study was to determine the clinical significance of the serum levels of HSP90 in melanoma patients. </span></span><strong><span style="font-size: small;">Material and methods: </span></strong><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">A total number of 98 melanoma patients were enrolled into this study. Serum HSP90 concentrations were determined by the solid-phase sandwich ELISA method. Age and sex matched 43 healthy controls were included in the analysis. </span></span><strong><span style="font-size: small;">Results: </span></strong><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">The median age of patients was 51 years, ranging from 16 to 85 years. The majority of patients were male (61%), had lesions in axial localizations (54%) and had metastatic disease (61%). Moreover, most of the patients with metastatic disease had M1c diseases (73%). The baseline serum HSP90 levels of melanoma patients </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">were significantly higher than those of the control subjects (median values 49.76 v 27.07ng/ml, respectively, p<0.001). </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">However, clinical variables, such as age, gender, site of lesion, histology, lymph node involvement, stage, serum LDH levels and response to chemotherapy, were found not correlated with serum HSP90 concentrations (p>0.05). Moreover, serum HSP90 level was found not prognostic on survival (p=0.683). </span></span><strong><span style="font-size: small;">Conclusions: </span></strong><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Times New Roman; font-size: small;">Serum levels of HSP90 may have a diagnostic value in melanoma. However, its predictive and prognostic values were not determined. </span></span>