Abstract
Background: Breast cancer (BCa) is a serious global health burden among females, and the development of resistance represents an important challenge to BCa treatment. Here, we examined the expression of toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2) in BCa patients and the prognostic value of TLR2 for predicting endocrine resistance.Methods: The study included 150 BCa patients, of which 82 underwent endocrine therapy. TLR2 mRNA expression was measured by quantitative Real-Time PCR, and its prognostic value was determined by Kaplan-Meier survival analysis. Changes in the expression of TLR2 in BCa patients with endocrine resistance were assessed, and the value of TLR2 for predicting endocrine resistance was evaluated using the receiver operating characteristic curve analysis.Results: TLR2 expression was higher in BCa tissue than in normal tissue and associated with tumor size, HER2 status, tumor subtype, and TNM stage. TLR2 upregulation was associated with poor prognosis in patients with BCa, as well as endocrine resistance, and TLR2 upregulation was more prevalent among HER2-positive BCa cases. The predictive performance of TLR2 for endocrine resistance was higher in HER2-positive BCa than in other hormone receptor-positive BCa cases.Conclusion: TLR2 upregulation is a promising biomarker for prognosis and predicting resistance to endocrine therapy. The relationship between TLR2 and HER2 indicates that TLR2 may be involved in endocrine resistance through the HER2 signaling pathway in BCa.
Highlights
Breast cancer (BCa) is the most frequently diagnosed malignancy and the leading cause of cancer-related mortality among women worldwide [1]
The results of Quantitative Real-Time PCR (qRT-PCR) indicated that toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2) mRNA expression was significantly higher in BCa tissues than in normal tissues (P < 0.001, Figure 1A)
Considering that TLR2 is dysregulated in BCa tissues, this study analyzed the relationship between TLR2 expression and the clinicopathological features of BCa patients
Summary
Breast cancer (BCa) is the most frequently diagnosed malignancy and the leading cause of cancer-related mortality among women worldwide [1]. There were 2,088,849 new BCa cases and 358,989 deaths from BCa in 2018, accounting for 24.2% of all cancer cases and 15.0% of total deaths among global malignancies in women [2]. Role of TLR2 in Breast Cancer epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2), namely, luminal A, luminal B, HER2+, and triple-negative BCa [3]. Emerging data indicate an increase in the incidence of resistance to endocrine therapy, especially in luminal B BCa [4]. Novel strategies to inhibit the activity of HER2 may increase the therapeutic efficacy of endocrine therapy in hormone receptor-positive BCa patients. Breast cancer (BCa) is a serious global health burden among females, and the development of resistance represents an important challenge to BCa treatment. We examined the expression of toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2) in BCa patients and the prognostic value of TLR2 for predicting endocrine resistance
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