CpG-island methylation of GATA-family members GATA3 and GATA5 in renal cell carcinoma and association with clinicopathological parameters and progression-free survival.

Abstract

370 Background: Transcriptional inactivation and CGI methylation of GATA3 and −5 has been reported to be involved in mammary carcinoma, pancreatic cancer, colorectal and gastric carcinogenesis. A recent study demonstrated that a loss of GATA-3 expression due to partially methylation silencing in several renal cell carcinoma (RCC) patients. We quantitatively investigated GATA3 and −5 CGI methylation in RCC and analyzed its association with clinical characteristics as well as progression free survival of patients. Methods: Methylation data were obtained from a quantitative methylation-specific polymerase chain reaction assay (QMSP) for both genes. We investigated 108 RCC and 77 paired tissue samples as well as six RCC cell lines. Statistical analyses were carried out using the paired t-test for matched tumor (TU) and adjacent normal (adN) samples, logistic regression for comparisons of independent samples and cox regression for survival analysis. Results: In paired samples we found a significant higher methylation in TU compared to adN for GATA3 (P=0.007) and for GATA5 (P=3.6*10−9) for all RCCs. GATA5 showed also strong correlations between methylation and status of metastasis (P=0.05) and advanced (pT≥3 and/or N+, M+) tumor samples compared to localized (pT≤2, N0, M0) tumors (P=4.7*10−9). A decreased progression free survival in cox proportional hazard model analysis could be demonstrated for patients with a high GATA5 methylation (P=0.0006, HR=6.5) and a trend could also be seen for GATA3 methylated patients (P=0.06). Conclusions: GATA3 and −5 were identified to demonstrate tumor-specific CGI hypermethylation in renal cell cancer patients. The association of GATA5 CGI methylation with metastasis, advanced disease and progression free survival of patients indicates that epigenetic alterations of both genes are involved in renal cell carcinogenesis. GATA5 methylation could serve as a biomarker for tumor progression. Further prospective and functional investigations are necessary to clarify whether CGI methylation of GATA family members can provide independent information for future clinical management of patients with RCC.