Korean J Intern Med.  2001 Mar;16(1):30-35.

Detection of Malignant Cells in Pleural Fluid or Ascites by CD44v8-10/CD44v10 competitive RT-PCR

• Ahn MJ
• Noh YH
• Yoon HJ
• Yang SC
• Sohn JW
• Choi JH
• Lee YY
• Choi IY
• Kim IS
• Lee YS
• Park CK

Abstract

BACKGROUND: CD44 is a cell surface adhesion molecule which has been implicated in various biologic functions as lymphocyte homing and activation, cellular migration and extracellular matrix adhesion. Over-expression of CD44v8- 10 has been found in several cancers and is considered to be associated with tumor progression and metastasis. Recently, a novel molecular method, CD44v8- 10/CD44v10 competitive reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction(RT-PCR) has been developed for detecting cancer cells over-expressing CD44v8-10.
METHODS
We analyzed from benign and malignant pleural effusion and ascites by CD44 competitive RT-PCR and compared to the conventional cytology.
RESULTS
The CD44 competitive RT-PCR analysis showed that all the 24 samples associated with benign disease presented a predominant expression of the CD44v10 transcript (v8-10/v10 ratio: 0.126-0.948), whereas 6 of 7 malignant pleural samples associated with cytology positive cancer expressed the CD44v8-10 transcript (v8-10/v10 ratio > 1.00).
CONCLUSION
These results indicate that CD44 competitive RT-PCR assay is a useful and adjunct to cytological examination in cancer diagnosis, especially in detecting exfoliated cancer cells in pleural effusion.

Keyword

Malignant effusion; Malignant ascites; CD44v8-10/CD44v10 competitive reverse transcription- polymerase chain reaction

MeSH Terms

Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Antigens, CD44/analysis*
Ascites/pathology*
Ascites/immunology*
Base Sequence
Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung/pathology
Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung/immunology
Comparative Study
Female
Gastrointestinal Neoplasms/pathology
Gastrointestinal Neoplasms/immunology
Human
Lung Neoplasms/pathology
Lung Neoplasms/chemistry
Male
Middle Age
Molecular Sequence Data
Pleural Effusion, Malignant/pathology*
Pleural Effusion, Malignant/chemistry*
Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction*
Sensitivity and Specificity
Support, Non-U.S. Gov't