M. Hamada et al., THE P53 GENE IS A POTENT DETERMINANT OF CHEMOSENSITIVITY AND RADIOSENSITIVITY IN GASTRIC AND COLORECTAL CANCERS, Journal of cancer research and clinical oncology, 122(6), 1996, pp. 360-365
We previously reported that introduction of the wild-type p53 gene int
o human cancer cells with deleted p53 enhanced apoptosis induced by ch
emotherapy [Fujiwara et al. (1994) Cancer Res 54:2287]. This suggests
that p53 status could be a potent determinant of the therapeutic effic
acy of DNA-damaging cancer therapy. We analyzed 24 patients with gastr
ic or colorectal cancer for p53 mutations and apoptotic changes in sur
gical specimens. Out of 11 patients with gastric cancer, 3 were treate
d with chemotherapeutic drugs before resection; 5 of 13 patients with
colorectal cancer had 30 Gy radiation prior to surgery. p53 mutations
were detected in 4 cases of gastric cancer (36.4%) and in 6 cases of c
olorectal cancer (46.2%) by immunohistochemical staining. The preopera
tive DNA-damaging therapies increased the number of apoptotic cells in
wild-type-p53-expressing tumors; tumors with mutant p53, however, sig
nificantly showed fewer apoptotic cells compared with those expressing
wild-type p53. The p53-inducible WAF1/CIP1 protein was immunohistoche
mically observed in wild-type-p53-containing tumors, whereas mutant-p5
3-expressing tumors expressed no detectable WAF1/CIP1. Taken together,
we conclude that p53 mutations are associated with the poor response
of chemotherapy and radiotherapy.