|
|||||
|
|
||||||
Originally published as JCO Early Release 10.1200/JCO.2006.05.9238 on September 11 2006 © 2006 American Society of Clinical Oncology. Loss of Heterozygosity 1p36 and 19q13 Is a Prognostic Factor for Overall Survival in Patients With Diffuse WHO Grade 2 Gliomas Treated Without Chemotherapy
From the Department of Neurosurgery, Inselspital; Division of Neuropathology, Institute of Pathology, University of Bern, Switzerland; Institute of Neuropathology, RWTH University Hospital, Aachen, Germany Address reprint requests to Luigi Mariani, MD, Leitender Arzt und Chefarzt-Stv., Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Universitätsspital Inselspital, CH-3010 Bern, Switzerland; e-mail: luigi.mariani{at}insel.ch
PURPOSE: This study was conducted to elucidate the impact of loss of heterozygosity (LOH) for chromosomes 1p36 and 19q13 on the overall survival of patients with diffusely infiltrating WHO grade 2 gliomas treated without chemotherapy. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We assessed the LOH status of tumors from patients harboring WHO grade 2 gliomas diagnosed between 1991 and 2000. Patients were either followed after initial biopsy or treated by surgery and/or radiation therapy (RT). Overall survival, time to malignant transformation, and progression-free survival were last updated as of March 2005. RESULTS: Of a total of 79 patients, LOH 1p36 and LOH 19q13 could be assessed in 67 and 66 patients, respectively. The median follow-up after diagnosis was 6 years. Loss of either 1p or 19q, in particular codeletion(s) at both loci, was found to positively impact on both overall survival (log-rank P < .01), progression-free survival, and survival without malignant transformation (P < .05). Tumor volume (P < .0001), neurologic deficits at diagnosis (P < .01), involvement of more than one lobe (P < .01), and absence of an oligodendroglial component (P < .05) were also predictors of shorter overall survival. The extent of surgery was similar in patients with or without LOH 1p and/or 19q; RT was more frequently resorted to for patients without than for patients with LOH 1p/19q (30% v 60%). CONCLUSION: The presence of LOH on either 1p36 or 19q13, and in particular codeletion of both loci is a strong, nontreatment-related, prognostic factor for overall survival in patients with diffusely infiltrating WHO grade 2 gliomas.
Low-grade cerebral gliomas of diffusely infiltrating type (WHO grade 2) represent a heterogeneous group of tumors with astrocytoma, oligodendroglioma (OD), and mixed oligoastrocytoma (OA) being the most common and clinically significant neoplastic entities.1-3 Median overall survival times of 6 years4-6 are nothing less than discouraging, given the relatively young age and good clinical condition of this patient population at the time of diagnosis. The clinical course of the disease may be highly variable and ultimately contingent on the occurrence of malignant progression. The potential impact of any therapeutic intervention on long-term survival is unclear because the prognosis of affected patients seems to depend mainly on factors that can not be influenced.7 Age over 40 years, presence of neurologic deficits at diagnosis, larger tumor size, bihemispheric involvement, purely astrocytic composition, and high proliferating cell fraction have been perceived as the most reliable, independent prognostic factors identifying patients at high risk for earlier progression and shorter overall survival.4,8-10 The catalog of genetic events underlying the disease is expanding, and the prognostic sequelae of individual molecular alterations are being increasingly appreciated.1,6,11-17 Loss of heterozygosity (LOH) on chromosomal arms 1p and 19q has been found to occur in the majority of oligodendrogliomas14,16,18-20 and in a significant proportion of astrocytomas.14,21 Patients with tumors harboring this genetic constellation have been shown both to respond to chemotherapy and to have longer progression-free survival.19,22,23 It is, however, unclear whether LOH 1p and/or 19q is also a prognostic factor for overall survival. In this study, we report on the impact of LOH 1p36/19q13 on survival of a cohort of patients with WHO grade 2 gliomas,9 in whom chemotherapy was not part of the treatment.
Patient Selection and Management Policy We followed since 2001 a cohort of 79 patients with WHO grade 2 glioma diagnosed at the University Hospital of Bern (Bern, Switzerland) between January 1991 and December 2000. After surgery or biopsies, patients were typically observed without adjuvant treatment. The policy of our institution was to recommend early radiation therapy (RT) to patients with two or more of the following risk factors for early tumor progression: age older than 45 years, preoperative neurologic deficits, large residual tumor volume after surgery (> 5 cm in cross-sectional diameter or more than 60 mL in volume), bilateral involvement (infiltration of the corpus callosum), mass effect with midline shift, and a gemistocytic component. At tumor progression, the patients were typically offered repeat surgery whenever possible or RT. None of the patients was treated by chemotherapy as of March 2005.
Data Collection, Histopathologic Reassessment, Definition of End Points
Measurement of Tumor Volume
LOH on Chromosomal loci 1p36 and 19q13
Statistical Analysis LOH, age older or younger than 40 years; presence of any neurologic deficit at diagnosis; presence of oligodendroglial, fibrillary astrocytic, or gemistocytic components; extension to one or more lobes; frontal versus extrafrontal location; tumor volume inferior or superior to 60 mL at diagnosis and inferior or superior to 30 mL after surgery; and tumor resection of more or less than 50% and 75% of the initial tumor volume were analyzed for potential association with survival end points using the Kaplan-Meier regression method and the log-rank test for statistical significance. The effect of LOH on outcome end points was tested separately for each microsatellite locus. Pearson's correlations were used for correlation of all normally distributed variables; Spearman's Rho correlations were used for ordinal-scaled variables or those not normally distributed. Potential correlations between factors significantly associated with survival end points were assessed using the Mann-Whitney test or the Fisher's exact test based on crosstabs. The level of significance was considered at = 0.05 for a two-tailed hypothesis if not otherwise specified in the text. Statistical tests were used with an explorative intention, and no alpha-correction was performed. Multivariate analysis of factors associated with overall survival with a significance level of at least 0.05 was performed using the Cox proportional regression model analysis in a stepwise manner.
Descriptive Statistics Clinical data, MRI, and histopathologic results. The mean age of the cohort of 79 patients at diagnosis was 41 years (range, 20 to 76 years; median 38.3 years); 43 patients were 40 years old or younger, 36 were older; the male:female ratio was 1.55 (48:31). The preoperative KPS was 90 or 100 in 72 patients (91.1%; range, 70% to 100%). Epilepsy was the first manifestation in 57 patients (76%), and neurologic deficits were present at diagnosis in 26 patients (33%). The tumor was located on the left in 51% of patients and on the right in 44%. Bilateral involvement was found in 5% of patients. Tumor location was in one lobe in 41% and in more than one lobe in 59% of the cases; the majority of tumors had frontoinsular involvement (59%). Mean tumor volume at diagnosis was 90 ± 72 cm3. Fifty-six percent of tumors were larger than 60 cm3. Twelve patients (15%) had a biopsy, and 67 (85%) had surgical resection at diagnosis. All tumors were WHO grade 2. Fifty-nine tumors (75%) were classified as astrocytoma, 14 (17.5%) as oligodendroglial, and 6 (7.5%) as OD. A significant gemistocytic component was found in 14 astrocytomas. A tumor resection of more than 50%, more than 75%, and more than 90% was achieved in 60%, 20%, and 4.4% of the patients, respectively. Overall, 47 patients (59.5%) were treated with RT; among them, 15 (19%) had early RT (within 6 months from diagnosis) because of the presence of two or more risk factors as listed herein (12 patients) or because of their choice (three patients); 32 patients (40.5%) had delayed RT at tumor progression. The mean follow-up for overall survival of the 79 patients was 80 ± 43 months (6 years and 8 months; range, 1 to 165 months, median, 71 months). Thirty-nine patients (49.5%) died during the observation period. Thirty-one (50%) of 62 assessable patients had suffered malignant transformation by the last follow-up.
LOH for 1p and 19q By the time of follow-up, 66% of the patients without any evidence of LOH 1p or 19q had been treated by RT, whereas only 31% with LOH 1p and/or 19q needed that treatment. None of the 15 patients who had received early RT had LOH 1p or 19q. The mean overall survival of the 68 patients in whom the 1p or 19q status could be assessed for at least one chromosomal locus was 81.48 ± 44.3 months (median, 72 months).
Correlation With Survival End Points
Malignant Transformation and Tumor Progression Larger tumors (P < .0001), purely astrocytic tumors (P < .05), presence of neoplastic gemistocytes (P < .01), tumors with multilobar involvement (P < .01), and tumors with intact 1p (P < .05) or intact 19q (P < .05) were more likely to undergo malignant transformation (Table 1). Tumor volume (P < .001) pre- and postoperatively, the involvement of more than one cerebral lobe (P < .01) and an intact 19q (P < .05) were predictors of an earlier tumor progression. Absence of LOH 1p showed a similar tendency (P = .08) but did not reach statistical significance. The multivariate, stepwise Cox regression model indicated preoperative tumor volume followed by the presence of allelic codeletions of 1p and 19q as the best predictors of overall survival, time to malignant transformation, and progression-free survival.
Our data demonstrate that LOH 1p36.21-33, especially in combination with LOH 19q13.31-41, is a favorable true prognostic factor for overall survival in patients with diffusely infiltrating, WHO grade 2 gliomas. LOH 1p/19q was also significantly associated with a longer survival without malignant transformation and without tumor progression in these patients. Although this is a retrospective study, it has significant strengths: first, the length of follow-up: 30 (44%) of 68 patients in whom the LOH status could be assessed were dead after a median follow-up of 6 years; second, none of the patients was treated by chemotherapy, which is an effective therapy and therefore a potentially confounding factor for survival analysis in tumors with 1p loss22; third, the extent of surgery was comparable for patients with and without LOH; and fourth, RT was performed more often in patients without than in patients with LOH, meaning that the survival advantage of patients with LOH can not be attributed to RT. Tumor volume and involvement of more cerebral lobes, presence of neurologic deficits at diagnosis, and absence of an oligodendroglial component were also associated with shorter overall survival, as has been reported previously.4,9 After multivariate analysis, tumor volume and LOH 1p/19q were the strongest independent predictors of overall survival. The relative proportions of the histologic subtypes (75% astrocytomas, 17.5% OAs, and 7.5% ODs) and the frequency of combined LOH 1p/19q (13% in astrocytomas, 50% in OAs, and 83% in ODs) found in this study are in the range of what has been reported previously.6,17,20,24,26,27 The relatively high percentage of oligodendroglial tumors in this series reflects a trend over the last years, whereby an even small but typical oligodendroglial component is considered important and leads to the diagnosis of a mixed glioma (OA),24 in accordance with the WHO guidelines. These diagnostic criteria lead to a strict definition of astrocytomas. In this series, patients with LOH 1p/19qpositive astrocytomas had a longer overall survival than patients with LOH 1p/19qnegative astrocytomas; this finding stresses the importance of LOH analysis also in this subgroup of patients and not only in patients with oligodendroglial tumors. That LOH 1p/19q is a prognostic factor in patients with diffusely infiltrating gliomas is not surprising and has been anticipated by others.19-22,28 However, the available series are not conclusive for the association between this genetic signature and overall survival in WHO grade 2 tumors. Felsberg et al21 reported on 38 patients with WHO grade 2 oligodendroglial tumors and showed a trend for a longer overall survival in the 29 patients with a combined LOH 1p and 19q compared with the nine patients without LOH; however, the difference did not reach statistical significance. Whether the patients were treated by chemotherapy or not is not reported in the paper. Kujas et al20 reported longer progression-free survival in low-grade glioma patients with LOH 1p compared with those with intact 1p. There was a high proportion of ODs (53%) in that series and the large majority of the patients had received chemotherapy. The follow-up for overall survival, with only 30 patients (23%) having died, was probably too short to reveal a significant survival advantage for patients with LOH. Idbaih et al28 reported a positive effect of complete loss of 1p on the overall survival of patients with gliomas, all grades confounded (WHO II-IV); only 39 of 108 patients had a WHO grade 2 glioma, and the results for that subgroup of patients were not shown in the paper. We assume that the size of the sample (21 patients with LOH 1p versus 16 without LOH 1p) and the short follow-up did not allow for a conclusive statement concerning a potential association with overall survival. The majority of the patients in that series were also treated by chemotherapy. Our findings support routine LOH 1p/19q testing to better identify good risk WHO grade 2 glioma patients. Because tumors with LOH 1p/19q are likely to respond to chemotherapy,22 this treatment option may be preferred to RT5 in this subgroup of patients. However, the dilemma in the management of patients with a WHO grade 2 glioma is still unsolved, and the role of LOH 1p/19q testing in the decision process needs to be clarified in appropriately designed studies. The presence of LOH on either 1p36 or 19q13, and in particular codeletion of both loci is a strong, nontreatment-related prognostic factor for overall survival in patients with diffusely infiltrating WHO grade 2 gliomas.
The authors indicated no potential conflicts of interest.
We thank Pietro Ballinari of the Department of Statistics of the University of Berne for his assistance in the analysis of the data and Andreas Kappeler, PhD, Institute of Pathology, University of Bern, for support with the molecular genetic analysis.
published online ahead of print at www.jco.org on September 11, 2006. Terms in blue are defined in the glossary, found at the end of this article and online at www.jco.org. Authors' disclosures of potential conflicts of interest and author contributions are found at the end of this article.
1. Cavenee WK, Furnari FB, Nagane M, et al: Diffusely infiltrating astrocytomas, in Kleihues P, Cavenee WK (eds): Pathology and Genetics of Tumours of the Nervous System. Lyon, France, IARC Press, 2000, pp 10-21 2. Kleihues P, Davis RL, Ohgaki H, et al: Diffuse astrocytoma, in Kleihues P, Cavenee WK (eds): Pathology and Genetics of Tumours of the Nervous System. Lyon, France, IARC Press, 2000, pp 22-26 3. Kleihues P, Louis DN, Scheithauer BW, et al: The WHO classification of tumors of the nervous system. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol 61:215-225, 2002[Medline] 4. Pignatti F, van den BM, Curran D, et al: Prognostic factors for survival in adult patients with cerebral low-grade glioma. J Clin Oncol 20:2076-2084, 2002 5. Van Den Bent MJ, Afra D, De Witte O, et al: Long-term efficacy of early versus delayed radiotherapy for low-grade astrocytoma and oligodendroglioma in adults: The EORTC 22845 randomised trial. Lancet 366:985-990, 2005[CrossRef][Medline] 6. Ohgaki H, Kleihues P: Population-based studies on incidence, survival rates, and genetic alterations in astrocytic and oligodendroglial gliomas. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol 64:479-489, 2005[Medline] 7. Cavaliere R, Lopes MB, Schiff D: Low-grade gliomas: An update on pathology and therapy. Lancet Neurol 4:760-770, 2005[CrossRef][Medline] 8. Giannini C, Scheithauer BW, Weaver AL, et al: Oligodendrogliomas: Reproducibility and prognostic value of histologic diagnosis and grading. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol 60:248-262, 2001[Medline] 9. Mariani L, Siegenthaler P, Guzman R, et al: The impact of tumour volume and surgery on the outcome of adults with supratentorial WHO grade II astrocytomas and oligoastrocytomas. Acta Neurochir (Wien) 146:441-448, 2004[CrossRef][Medline] 10. Stupp R, Janzer RC, Hegi ME, et al: Prognostic factors for low-grade gliomas. Semin Oncol 30:23-28, 2003[Medline] 11. Chattopadhyay P, Rathore A, Mathur M, et al: Loss of heterozygosity of a locus on 17p13.3, independent of p53, is associated with higher grades of astrocytic tumours. Oncogene 15:871-874, 1997[CrossRef][Medline] 12. Daido S, Takao S, Tamiya T, et al: Loss of heterozygosity on chromosome 10q associated with malignancy and prognosis in astrocytic tumors, and discovery of novel loss regions. Oncol Rep 12:789-795, 2004[Medline] 13. Maintz D, Fiedler K, Koopmann J, et al: Molecular genetic evidence for subtypes of oligoastrocytomas. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol 56:1098-1104, 1997[Medline] 14. Okamoto Y, Di Patre PL, Burkhard C, et al: Population-based study on incidence, survival rates, and genetic alterations of low-grade diffuse astrocytomas and oligodendrogliomas. Acta Neuropathol (Berl) 108:49-56, 2004[CrossRef][Medline] 15. Rasheed A, Herndon JE, Stenzel TT, et al: Molecular markers of prognosis in astrocytic tumors. Cancer 94:2688-2697, 2002[CrossRef][Medline] 16. Reifenberger G, Louis DN: Oligodendroglioma: Toward molecular definitions in diagnostic neuro-oncology. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol 62:111-126, 2003[Medline] 17. Walker C, du Plessis DG, Joyce KA, et al: Molecular pathology and clinical characteristics of oligodendroglial neoplasms. Ann Neurol 57:855-865, 2005[CrossRef][Medline] 18. Thiessen B, Maguire JA, McNeil K, et al: Loss of heterozygosity for loci on chromosome arms 1p and 10q in oligodendroglial tumors: Relationship to outcome and chemosensitivity. J Neurooncol 64:271-278, 2003[CrossRef][Medline] 19. Smith JS, Perry A, Borell TJ, et al: Alterations of chromosome arms 1p and 19q as predictors of survival in oligodendrogliomas, astrocytomas, and mixed oligoastrocytomas. J Clin Oncol 18:636-645, 2000 20. Kujas M, Lejeune J, Benouaich-Amiel A, et al: Chromosome 1p loss: A favorable prognostic factor in low-grade gliomas. Ann Neurol 58:322-326, 2005[CrossRef][Medline] 21. Felsberg J, Erkwoh A, Sabel MC, et al: Oligodendroglial tumors: Refinement of candidate regions on chromosome arm 1p and correlation of 1p/19q status with survival. Brain Pathol 14:121-130, 2004[Medline] 22. Hoang-Xuan K, Capelle L, Kujas M, et al: Temozolomide as initial treatment for adults with low-grade oligodendrogliomas or oligoastrocytomas and correlation with chromosome 1p deletions. J Clin Oncol 22:3133-3138, 2004 23. Smith JS, Jenkins RB: Genetic alterations in adult diffuse glioma: Occurrence, significance, and prognostic implications. Front Biosci 5:D213-D231, 2000[Medline] 24. Coons SW, Johnson PC, Scheithauer BW, et al: Improving diagnostic accuracy and interobserver concordance in the classification and grading of primary gliomas. Cancer 79:1381-1393, 1997[CrossRef][Medline] 25. Reifenberger G: Oligoastrocytoma, in Kleihues P, Cavenee WK (eds): Pathology and Genetics of Tumours of the Nervous System. Lyon, France, IARC Press, 2000, pp 65-67 26. Smith JS, Alderete B, Minn Y, et al: Localization of common deletion regions on 1p and 19q in human gliomas and their association with histological subtype. Oncogene 18:4144-4152, 1999[CrossRef][Medline] 27. Kleihues P, Cavenee WK: Pathology and genetics of tumours of the nervous system. Lyon, France, IARC Press, 2000 28. Idbaih A, Marie Y, Pierron G, et al: Two types of chromosome 1p losses with opposite significance in gliomas. Ann Neurol 58:483-487, 2005[CrossRef][Medline] Submitted February 14, 2006; accepted June 23, 2006.
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||
|
Copyright © 2006 by the American Society of Clinical Oncology, Online ISSN: 1527-7755. Print ISSN: 0732-183X
|