Expression of multiple drug resistance-associated proteins in non-small cell lung cancer tissues and its clinical significance

Abstract

Multiple drug resistance is one of the important reasons that patients failed to chemotherapy and died of tumors. The aim of this study is to investigate the expression of resistance-related proteins, P-glycoprotein (P-gp), multidrug resistance-associated protein (MRP), lung resistance-related protein (LRP), topoisomerase II (Topo II) and glutathion-S-transferase-π (GST-π) in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) tissues and their clinical significance. Expression of P-gp, MRP, LRP, Topo II and GST-π was measured in 98 NSCLC tissues by immunohistochemistry SP method. The positive rate of P-gp, MRP, LRP, Topo II and GST-π was 27.6%, 11.2%, 75.5%, 50.0% and 64.3% respectively. Significant relationship was observed between expression of LRP and TopoII and histological classification. No remarkable difference in expression of multiple drug resistance-related proteins was found among different TNM stages. A total of 47 patients with NSCLC were treated with chemotherapy. There was significant relationship between expression of P-gp, LRP and GST-π and chemotherapy response (P < 0.05). NSCLC has overexpression of multiple drug resistance-related proteins. Combined detection of these proteins may be useful to guide chemotherapy and predict the response for lung cancer.