S100A16, a promising candidate as a prognostic marker for platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy in resected lung adenocarcinoma

Although cisplatin-based adjuvant chemotherapy improves the survival of patients with resected non-small-cell lung cancer, not all patients show a survival benefit, and some patients experience severe toxicity. Therefore, identifying biomarkers is important for selecting subgroups of patients who may show improved survival with platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy. S100A16 is thought to play key roles during different steps of tumor progression. The aim of this study was to evaluate the use of S100A16 expression as a prognostic marker in patients with completely resected lung adenocarcinoma receiving platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy.

S100A16 expression was immunohistochemically studied in 65 consecutive lung adenocarcinoma patients who underwent complete resection and received platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate the effect of S100A16 expression on disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS).

S100A16 expression was detected in 26 of the 65 (40.0%) lung adenocarcinoma patients. Although S100A16 expression was not correlated with DFS (P=0.062), it was significantly correlated with OS (P=0.009). In addition, multivariable analysis revealed that S100A16 expression independently predicted a poorer survival (HR =4.79; 95% CI =1.87-12.23; P=0.001).

The present study revealed that S100A16 is a promising candidate as a prognostic marker for platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy in resected lung adenocarcinoma. A further large-scale study is needed to confirm the present results.