Authors: Lingyu Tian, Jiaqiang Ma, Lijie Ma, Bohao Zheng, Longzi Liu, Danjun Song, Yining Wang, Zhao Zhang, Qiang Gao, Kang Song & Xiaoying Wang
Online: https://wjso.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12957-020-02082-5
Issue: World J Surg Oncol. 2020 Nov 23;18(1):303.
Abstract
Objective
Immunotherapy targeting the programmed cell death protein-1 (PD-1)/programmed cell death protein ligand 1 (PD-L1) pathway has been observed to be efficient in several solid tumors. We aim to investigate the prognostic significance of PD-1/PD-L1 expression profile in intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC).
Materials and methods
We investigated the expression of PD-1, PD-L1, CD8+ T cells, and CD68+ macrophages in paired tumor and adjacent normal tissues from 322 ICC patients using tyramide signal amplification (TSA)-based multiplexed immunohistochemistry.
Results
We found that high proportion of tumor-infiltrating CD8+ PD-1High within CD8+ PD-1+ T cells significantly correlated with advanced TNM stage (P = 0.035). ICC patients with high proportion of CD8+ PD-1High in CD8+ PD-1+ had worse postoperative survival than low proportion patients (P = 0.0037), which was an independently prognostic factor for OS (P = 0.025,). The density of CD68+ PD-L1+ significantly and positively correlated with the density of CD8+ PD-1High (P < 0.0001, r = 0.5927). The proportion of CD68+ PD-L1+ within CD68+ ICC was the risk factor for OS and TTR but not an independently factor for prognosis. The CD68+ PD-L1+ macrophages and CD8+ PD-1High T cells may cooperatively play a role in inhibiting anti-tumor immunity.
Conclusion
CD68+ PD-L1+ macrophages and CD8+ PD-1High T cells predict unfavorable prognosis, which could also bring new progress about immune target therapy in ICC research.
