Carboplatin-gemcitabine combination chemotherapy upregulates AKR1B10 expression in bladder cancer

AKR1B10 is considered to contribute to cell proliferation and chemoresistance. In the present study, we examined whether AKR1B10 expression is associated with disease-free survival in bladder cancer patients.

We obtained bladder cancer specimens from 10 patients before and after chemotherapy and measured AKR1B10 mRNA levels using real-time PCR. In addition, we conducted an immunohistochemical examination of AKR1B10 expression in 57 patients with bladder cancer before and after chemotherapy.

AKR1B10 mRNA expression was significantly higher in the post-chemotherapy group than in the pre-chemotherapy group (p < 0.001). The average immunohistochemical intensity score in the pre-chemotherapy group was 0.83 ± 1.08, compared with the significantly higher score of 2.03 ± 1.03 in the post-chemotherapy group (p < 0.001). The disease-free survival rate of post-chemotherapy AKR1B10(+) patients (61.2%) was significantly lower than that of AKR1B10(-) patients (100%) (log-rank test, p = 0.039).

Although the present study is small and preliminary, our data suggest that post-chemotherapy AKR1B10 expression may be associated with a poor prognosis in patients who received carboplatin-gemcitabine combination chemotherapy and underwent cystectomy. Further study is warranted to elucidate its clinical significance.