Serological and immunohistochemical HER‐2/neu statuses do not correlate and lack prognostic value for ovarian cancer patients

HOOPMANN M., SACHSE K., VALTER M.M., BECKER M., NEUMANN R., ORTMANN M., GÖHRING U.‐J., THOMAS A., MALLMANN P. & SCHÖNDORF T. (2010) European Journal of Cancer Care
Serological and immunohistochemical HER‐2/neu statuses do not correlate and lack prognostic value for ovarian cancer patients The serodiagnostics of extracellular domain (ECD) HER‐2/neu has turned into an evidenced‐based tumour marker for HER‐2/neu‐positive breast cancer patients. This study investigated the clinical relevance of immunohistochemical and serum HER‐2/neu in 44 patients with advanced ovarian cancer. The Hercept‐Test® from DAKO Diagnostics was used to analyse immunohistochemical HER‐2/neu expression. The HER‐2/neu ECD in serum was determined quantitatively by Bayer Immuno 1? Immunoanalyser. The HER‐2/neu serum values were correlated to the clinical course of disease and to established prognostic factors, i.e. progression‐free and overall survival. Some 23% of patients (n= 11) expressed HER‐2/neu serum levels higher than 15 ng/mL, whereas only 7.7% (n= 2) of the patients examined by immunohistochemistry showed a HER‐2/neu overexpression of the tissue. None of them revealed an overexpression of HER‐2/neu ECD by serodiagnostics. HER‐2/neu overexpression did not correlate significantly to any of the analysed prognostic factors. According to progression‐free and overall survival, there was no significant difference between serologically HER‐2/neu‐positive or negative patients. For ovarian cancer patients, neither high HER‐2/neu serum levels, nor immunohistochemically determined HER‐2/neu positivity, appear to predict the course of disease. This study shows a lack of association between the immunohistochemical HER‐2/neu status and the serum level of solute extracelluar HER‐2/neu domain.