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Updated: Jan 15, 2026
Profiling of Estrogen-regulated MicroRNAs in Breast Cancer Cells
Published on: February 21, 2014
Transcriptomic profiles of endocrine-resistant breast cancer
Caroline Schagerholm Stanev1, Emmanouil G Sifakis2, Linnea Hases3,4
1Department of Oncology-Pathology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. caroline.schagerholm@ki.se.
Background:
The majority of breast cancer patients have tumors expressing estrogen receptor α (ER) and are treated with adjuvant endocrine therapy. However, nearly one-third relapse, most with retained ER expression.
Methods:
This study investigated patients with ER-positive and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-negative primary breast cancer. Patients with ER-positive relapses within five years of ongoing endocrine therapy were defined as endocrine-resistant (N = 69). Patients with no disease progression after 10 years were defined as endocrine-sensitive (N = 77). RNA was extracted from archived tumor blocks, followed by gene expression analysis.
Results:
Significant differences were observed with higher tumor grades, intrinsic subtype risk scores, and upregulated cell-cycle gene sets in resistant compared to sensitive patients' primary tumors. Metabolism-associated gene sets were upregulated, and estrogen-response gene sets downregulated in resistant patients' relapse compared to primary tumors.
Conclusions:
This study highlights gene sets associated with endocrine resistance and identifies transcriptomic and clinicopathological profiles that may serve as potential prognostic markers for therapy response.
