Expression and clinical significance of OTUB1 in breast cancer

Abstract

Objective To explore the expression level of OTUB1 and its clinical significance in breast cancer. Methods Immunohistochemistry was used to detect the expression level of OTUB1 in 78 cases of breast cancer tissues and 30 cases of normal breast tissue adjacent to carcinoma, and the relationships between OTUB1 and the clinical pathological features of breast cancer were analyzed. Results The positive expression rate of OTUB1 in breast cancer tissues [66.7% (52/78)] was significantly higher than that in adjacent normal breast tissues [30.0% (9/30)], with a statistically significant difference (χ2=11.851, P=0.001). OTUB1 expression level was related to the lymph node metastasis (χ2=5.029, P=0.025), postoperative TNM staging (χ2=4.478, P=0.034), expression of human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER-2) (χ2=8.775, P=0.003), expression of P53 (χ2=4.708, P=0.030), expression of estrogen receptor (ER) (χ2=10.364, P=0.001) and molecular subtypes (χ2=10.934, P=0.012). However, OTUB1 expression level in breast cancer was not related to the age (χ2=2.194, P=0.139), menopausal status (χ2=1.843, P=0.175), tumor size (χ2=0.643, P=0.423), histological grade (χ2=3.580, P=0.167), expression of progestin receptor (PR) (χ2=3.371, P=0.066) and expression of Ki-67 (χ2=1.345, P=0.246). Conclusion OTUB1 expression level increases in breast cancer, which is associated with the lymph node metastasis, TNM staging, expressions of HER-2, P53, ER and molecular subtypes of breast cancer. It suggests that the expression of OTUB1 is related to the progression and metastasis of breast cancer. Key words: Breast neoplasms; Immunohistochemistry; OTUB1