Abstract 104P
Background
The bona fide challenge that is recently evading the middle east countries and Egypt in particular is the undeniable alarming escalating incidence of BC among young females (<40 years old). Generally, the impression of BC patients in the middle east is that they present the disease at an earlier age and at a more advanced stage when compared to western countries. Concerning the current statistics in Egypt, the average age of Egyptian BC patients was found to be 10 years younger than American BC patients. Young Egyptian BC patients are 45x more likely to be diagnosed at stage III and 16x more likely to be diagnosed at stage IVcompared to old patients. Early diagnosis is the keyword for resolving such endemic crisis. Cell-free circulating nucleic acids such as Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) in the blood have recently been casted as a new class of promising cancer diagnostic biomarkers. The aim of this study is to identify a blood derived lncRNA-signature for early diagnosis of young Egyptian BC patients.
Methods
A cohort of BC patients (n=55) were recruited. Solid tumor and its normal conuterpart were resected. All tumors (100%) were invasive ductal carcinoma. Median age was 35 years old (range 22-73). Lymph node involvment was reported in 72.7%. High Ki67 was observed in 83.6%. Stage 3 was reported in 54.5 % of patients. Tumor size >5 cm was recorded in 65.45%. Liquid biopsies were collected from the same patients. Age-matched healthy controls were recruited (n=40). RNA was extracted, reverse transcribed andquantifiedusing q-RT-PCR.
Results
An elevated expression pattern of lncRNAs: MIAT, HOTAIR, MALAT-1 and H19 in young BC patients tissues and plasma levels compared to the older group were observed. Upon patients’ stratification, MIAT, HOTAIR and H19 expression levels were found to be associated with a high tumor grade, positive lymphnode metastasis, and high ki-67. However, MALAT-1 was highly elevated in more aggressive BC subtypes such as HER-2 and TNBC compared to luminal BC subtypes.
Conclusions
This study identify a blood derived lncRNA-signature for early diagnosis of young BC patients to be used as stable and non-invasive biomarker for such hard to diagnose and treat group of patients.
Clinical trial identification
Editorial acknowledgement
Legal entity responsible for the study
The authors.
Funding
L'Oreal UNESCO for Women in Science.
Disclosure
All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.