Value of MYC, BCL-2 and BCL-6 for Evaluation of Prognosis in Patients with Diffuse Large B Cell Lymphoma

Abstract

To analyze the prognostic value of BCL-2, BCL-6 and MYC in patients with diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL). One hundred and sixty three cases of DLBCL in our hospital from March 2012 to March 2015 were selected. The specimens of lymphoma tissue of patients were collected. The expression of BCL-2, BCL-6 and MYC was detected by immunohistochemical method. The fusion of IGH/BCL-2, the gene breakage of BCL-6 and MYC were detected by interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization. The correlation of the expression levels of BCL-2, BCL-6 and MYC with the clinicopathological features and prognosis in the patients with DLBCL was further analyzed. MYC, BCL-2 and BCL-6 showed pale brown or reddish brown positive signals, among them MYC mainly positively expressed on the cell membrane, and BCL-2 mainly expressed on the cytoplasm and local cell membrane, and BCL-6 mainly expressed in the nucleus. The expression level of BCL-2 in ECOG physical status score 2 was higher than that in patients with ＜2 scores, and the expression level of BCL-2 in CD5+ and germinal center B-cell-like (GCB) was significantly higher than that in patients with non-GCB (P＜0.05), and the international prognostic index (IPI) for 3-5 scores at the MYC expression level was significantly higher than that of the 0-2 score (P＜0.05); the expression level of BCL-6 in immune subtype CD5+ and GCB was significantly lower than that in non-GCB (P＜0.05). The results of Cox multivariate analysis showed that the expression level of BCL-2, BCL-6 and MYC significant correlate with the overall survival and progression-free survival (P＜0.05) of the patients with DLBCL. BCL-2, BCL-6 and MYC as important molecular markers are of high value for evaluating the prognosis of patients with DLBCL.