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Circulating tumor cells in breast cancer

par Ignatiadis, Michail ;Mavroudis, Dimitris
Référence Breast Cancer Risk Reduction and Early Detection, Springer US, page (219-234)
Publication Publié, 2010

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Résumé :

The presence of disseminated tumor cells (DTCs) in the bone marrow has been shown to predict poor clinical outcome in early stage breast cancer. However, peripheral blood is easier to obtain and allows for real time monitoring of minimal residual disease (MRD). Towards this end, circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the blood are detected using either direct methods, mainly antibody-based assays (immunocytochemistry, immunofluorescence, flow cytometry), or indirect methods, mainly nucleic acid-based assays (detection of mRNA transcripts by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction, RT-PCR). The detection of CTCs using RT-PCR for CK19 was shown to be an independent prognostic factor in women with early breast cancer. Furthermore, there has been considerable progress in genotyping, phenotyping and profiling micrometastatic cells. The challenge now is to integrate minimal residual disease as a prognostic and predictive tool in the management of breast cancer. This requires the standardization of micrometastatic cell detection and characterization which will allow the incorporation of CTCs into prospective clinical trials testing their clinical utility. © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010.