Telomerase RNA expression as a prognostic marker in patients with favorable histology Wilms tumor

Abstract

8519 Background: A primary objective of the fifth National Wilms Tumor Study (NWTS-5) was to identify novel prognostic indicators for patients with favorable histology (FH) Wilms tumor (WT). Telomerase is an enzyme that maintains telomeres and plays a key role in the cellular immortalization process. High expression of this enzyme correlates with unfavorable patient outcome in several pediatric and adult malignancies. We assessed whether levels of telomerase activity and RNA expression correlate with risk of recurrence in patients with FH WT. Methods: A case-cohort study was conducted involving 296 patients selected from NWTS-5 registrants who had pre-treatment frozen tumor samples available in the biology bank. Telomerase activity was measured using the telomeric repeat amplification protocol assay. Expression levels of TERT mRNA (encodes the telomerase catalytic component) and TERC/hTR (the telomerase RNA template) were measured using quantitative real-time PCR. Results: Forty-seven samples were exclude...