Minimal residual disease assessment of papillary thyroid carcinoma through circulating tumor cell‐based cytology

• Published in: Cancer medicine (Malden, MA) Vol. 11; no. 24; pp. 4830 - 4837
• Main Authors: Innaro, Nadia, Gervasi, Rita, Ferrazzo, Teresa, Garo, Nastassia C., Curto, Lucia S., Lavecchia, Annamaria, Aquila, Isabella, Donato, Giuseppe, Malara, Natalia
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01.12.2022; John Wiley and Sons Inc; Wiley
• Subjects: Age; Antigens; Biopsy; Carcinoma, Papillary - diagnostic imaging; Carcinoma, Papillary - surgery; Cell cycle; Cellular biology; circulating tumor cells; Cytology; cytology CTCs; Hematology; Humans; Informed consent; Liquid biopsy; Metastasis; Methods; Minimal residual disease; Neoplasm Recurrence, Local; Neoplasm, Residual; Neoplastic Cells, Circulating; Papillary thyroid cancer; Papillary thyroid carcinoma; Patients; Precision Medicine; PTC; recurrence risk; short‐time cultured CTCs; Software; Surgery; Survival analysis; Thyrocytes; Thyroglobulin; Thyroid cancer; Thyroid Cancer, Papillary; Thyroid Neoplasms - diagnosis; Thyroid Neoplasms - surgery; Tumor cells; White people; cytology CTCs; Liquid biopsy; circulating tumor cells; recurrence risk; short-time cultured CTCs; PTC
• ISSN: 2045-7634; 2045-7634
• DOI: 10.1002/cam4.4813

The overall estimated risk of recurrence after an apparently complete thyroid cancer resection ranges from <1% to 55%, and the high‐quality pathology report is crucial for proper risk stratification. The neck ultrasound (US) and serum thyroglobulin (Tg) and anti‐Tg antibody (TgAb) assays are the mainstays for Differentiated Thyroid Cancer (DTC) follow‐up. However, the neck US includes a high frequency of nonspecific findings and despite the serum, Tg unmasks the presence of thyrocytes, it is not discriminating between normal and malignant cells. In this study, to improve post‐surgery follow‐up of minimal residual disease in papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) patients, blood‐derived cytology specimens were evaluated for the presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs). The presence of CTCs of thyroid origin was confirmed by cytomorphological and tissue‐specific antigens analysis (Thyroid Transcription Factor‐1/TTF‐1 and Tg) and proliferative profile (percentage of cells in S‐phase). Our data revealed an unfavorable’ prognostic risk in patients with >5% CTCs (p = 0.09) and with >30% S‐phase cells at baseline (p = 0.0015), predicting ≤1 year relapsing lesion event. These results suggest a new intriguing frontier of precision oncology forefront cytology‐based liquid biopsy. minimal residual disease assessment in post surgery patients with papillary thyroid cancer through CTCs‐based cytology