Prognostic value of genomic damage in non small-cell lung cancer

Genomic alterations have been analysed in 65 non-small-cell lung cancer (NS CLC) tissue samples by using the arbitrarily primed polymerase chain reacti on (AP-PCR), which is a PCR-based genomic fingerprinting. We have shown tha t AP-PCR may be applied as a useful and feasible practical method for detec tion of the genomic alterations that accompany malignancy in NSGLC. Genomic changes detected by us consisted of: allelic losses or gains in anonymous DNA sequences, homozygously deleted DNA sequences and polymorphic DNA seque nces. According to these genomic changes, lung tumours evaluated in the pre sent study have been scored into three groups: low, moderate and high genom ic damage tumours. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of g enomic damage on patient survival. Survival analysis was carried out in 51 NSGLC patients. Our results revealed that high genomic damage patients show ed a poorer prognosis than those with low or moderate genomic damage (P=0.0 38), Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that patients with higher genomic alterations displayed an adjusted-by-stage risk ratio 4.26 times hi gher than the remaining patients (95% Cl = 1,03-17,54). We can conclude tha t genomic damage has an independent prognostic value of poor clinical evolu tion in NSCLC.