Combined Evaluation of Tumor-Infiltrating CD8 + and FoxP3 + Lymphocytes Provides Accurate Prognosis in Stage IA Lung Adenocarcinoma

• Published in: Annals of surgical oncology Vol. 27; no. 6; pp. 2102 - 2109
• Main Authors: Kinoshita, Fumihiko, Takada, Kazuki, Yamada, Yuichi, Oku, Yuka, Kosai, Keisuke, Ono, Yuki, Tanaka, Kensuke, Wakasu, Sho, Oba, Taro, Osoegawa, Atsushi, Tagawa, Tetsuzo, Shimokawa, Mototsugu, Oda, Yoshinao, Mori, Masaki
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 01.06.2020; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adenocarcinoma; Adenocarcinoma of Lung - diagnosis; Adenocarcinoma of Lung - mortality; Adenocarcinoma of Lung - pathology; Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Apoptosis; B7-H1 Antigen - metabolism; Biomarkers, Tumor - metabolism; CD8 antigen; CD8-Positive T-Lymphocytes - immunology; Cell death; Disease-Free Survival; Female; Forkhead protein; Forkhead Transcription Factors - metabolism; Foxp3 protein; Humans; Immunohistochemistry; Immunotherapy; Kaplan-Meier Estimate; Lung cancer; Lung Neoplasms - diagnosis; Lung Neoplasms - mortality; Lung Neoplasms - pathology; Lymphocytes; Lymphocytes, Tumor-Infiltrating - immunology; Male; Medical prognosis; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Multivariate analysis; Neoplasm Staging; Non-small cell lung carcinoma; Oncology; Patients; PD-L1 protein; Prognosis; Progression-Free Survival; Proportional Hazards Models; Small cell lung carcinoma; Surgery; Surgical Oncology; Translational Research and Biomarkers; Tumor cells; Tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes
• ISSN: 1068-9265; 1534-4681
• DOI: 10.1245/s10434-019-08029-9

Background Immunotherapy has become a standard treatment option for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), with the tumor microenvironment attracting significant attention. CD8 + and forkhead box protein P3 + (FoxP3 +) tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) influence the tumor microenvironment, but the clinical significance of CD8 + and FoxP3 + TILs in stage IA lung adenocarcinoma (LAD) is poorly understood. Methods We analyzed 203 patients with stage IA primary LAD who had undergone surgery at Kyushu University from January 2003 to December 2012. We evaluated CD8 + and FoxP3 + TILs by immunohistochemistry. We set the cutoff values at 50 cells/0.04 mm 2 for CD8 + TILs and 20 cells/0.04 mm 2 for FoxP3 + TILs, respectively. We divided the patients into four groups: CD8-Low/FoxP3-Low; CD8-High/FoxP3-Low; CD8-Low/FoxP3-High; and CD8-High/FoxP3-High. We compared clinical outcomes among them. Programmed cell death ligand-1 (PD-L1) expression by tumor cells was also evaluated as previously reported. Results Respectively, 104 (51.2%), 46 (22.7%), 22 (10.8%), and 31 (15.3%) patients were classified as CD8-Low/FoxP3-Low, CD8-High/FoxP3-Low, CD8-Low/FoxP3-High, and CD8-High/FoxP3-High. Both disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were significantly worse in the CD8-Low/FoxP3-High group than the other groups (5-year DFS: 66.3% vs. 90.5%; P  = 0.0007, 5-year OS: 90.9% vs. 97.0%; P  = 0.0077). In the multivariate analysis, CD8-Low/FoxP3-High and PD-L1 expression were independent prognostic factors of DFS, and lymphatic invasion, surgical procedure, and PD-L1 expression were independent prognostic factors of OS. Conclusions CD8-Low/FoxP3-High was an independent prognostic factor of DFS (hazard ratio: 3.22; 95% confidence interval: 1.321–7.179; P  = 0.0121) in stage IA LAD. Immunosuppressive conditions were associated with poor prognosis in stage IA LAD.