Detection of p53 Autoantibodies in Sera of Gastric Cancer Patients and Their Prognostic Relevance

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Abstract
Background: Changes in the p53 gene product can be immunogenic and enable the formation of p53 serum antibodies (p53ab), detectable in patients with different cancer types. So far, there have been no reports describing the detectability of p53ab in gastric cancer patients. Methods: We investigated the presence of p53ab and their clinical relevance in a cohort of 74 gastric cancer patients, using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay system. Results: In our investigation 20.3% of all patients (15 of 74) and 46.9% of the patients with immunohistochemically (IHC) p53-positive tumors (15 of 32) showed detectable p53ab in serum. All p53ab-positive patients had IHC p53-positive tumors. We have found a significant correlation of p53ab with a higher tumor stage (P = 0.002) and also with a poor prognosis of survival (P = 0.04). Conclusion: We have shown that in gastric cancer patients p53ab are also detectable and that p53ab positivity is a predictor of an unfavorable prognosis.