Evaluation of Signal Transducer and Activator of Transcription 3 (STAT-3) Protein Expression in Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma Cases in Hospital USM

• Published in: Diagnostics (Basel) Vol. 13; no. 9; p. 1649
• Main Authors: Muhamad, Izyan Rifhana, Che Ibrahim, Noorul Balqis, Hussain, Faezahtul Arbaeyah
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 07.05.2023; MDPI
• Subjects: Age; Analysis; Cancer therapies; Cell growth; Cytokines; Dehydrogenases; diffuse large B cell lymphoma; Ethnicity; Gender; Gene expression; Genetic transcription; Kinases; Lymphoma; Mutation; non-Hodgkin lymphoma; Non-Hodgkin's lymphomas; Pathogenesis; Patients; Protein expression; Proteins; STAT-3 protein; Tumors; non-Hodgkin lymphoma; STAT-3 protein; diffuse large B cell lymphoma; lymphoma
• ISSN: 2075-4418; 2075-4418
• DOI: 10.3390/diagnostics13091649

Evolving targeted therapy on Janus Associated Kinase-Signal Transducer and Activator of Transcription (JAK-STAT) signaling pathway, especially pertaining to STAT-3 protein in non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), provides new treatment strategies. STAT-3 protein also relates to the prognostication of NHL. Hence, we aimed to evaluate the expression of STAT-3 protein in NHL cases diagnosed in Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM). A retrospective cross sectional study using formalin fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) tissue blocks of 95 NHL cases were obtained. STAT-3 immunostaining was performed and evaluated. The proportion and association between the expression of STAT-3 protein with subtypes of NHL were statistically analyzed. The majority of the cases (78.9%) had positive STAT-3 protein expression. 64.2% were among aggressive B cell NHL, whilst 20.0% of them were diffuse large B cell lymphoma, a non-germinal center B subtype (DLBCL-NGCB). There is also an association between STAT-3 protein expression with DLBCL subtypes ( = 0.046). Our study demonstrated a remarkable expression of STAT-3 protein in NHL, in which DLBCL subtypes had significant association. A larger scale study with a combination of JAK protein evaluation should be undertaken in the future.