THE ASSOCIATION BETWEEN NM23 GENE-EXPRESSION AND SURVIVAL IN PATIENTSWITH SARCOMAS

The relationship between the expression of nm23, a putative metastasis -suppressor gene and prognosis was determined for 88 patients with sar comas. Immunohistochemistry using immunopurified anti-nm23 peptide ant ibodies was performed and the results of each case graded according to the degree of staining. Univariate and multivariate analyses were car ried out to determine the prognostic significance of nm23 staining for sarcoma patients. Expression of nm23 was found to increase in line wi th metastatic potential in many cases but this did not reach significa nce for the study as a whole. However, the possibility of nm23 loss oc curring in association with metastasis cannot be ruled out in some mor e aggressive sarcomas, as was demonstrated for six patients with low-s coring, unclassified and synovial sarcomas that had metastasized. The time to metastasis was longer for patients with grade 3 sarcomas (50-7 5% of tumour cells staining) than similar patients in other staining g roups. These results suggest that expression of nm23 genes in sarcomas is variable and has no value as a prognostic indicator for these mese nchymal tumours.