Clinicopathological Features, Surgical Outcomes, Oncogenic Status and PD-L1 Expression of Pulmonary Pleomorphic Carcinoma.

Abstract

Pulmonary pleomorphic carcinoma (PPC) is rare, and few studies have reported its features. We assessed the clinicopathological features, surgical outcomes, oncogenic status and programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression of PPC. We retrospectively reviewed data from 22 consecutive patients who underwent resection of PPC between 2007 and 2017. The predominant tissue type of the epithelial component was adenocarcinoma in 15 patients (68%) and the others in 7 patients (32%), and the 3-year disease-free survival rate tended to be better in patients with an adenocarcinoma component compared to patients with another component (40.0% vs. 17.1%, p=0.059). PD-L1 expression was observed in all eight tumors whose PD-L1 status could be examined and high PD-L1 expression (≥50%) was frequent (5/8, 63%). A predominant adenocarcinoma epithelial component in PPC might be associated with better survival outcomes and high PD-L1 expression might be frequent in PPC.