gms | German Medical Science

67th Annual Meeting of the German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC)
Joint Meeting with the Korean Neurosurgical Society (KNS)

German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC)

12 - 15 June 2016, Frankfurt am Main

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High-mobility group AT-hook protein 2 (HMGA 2) expression in MGMT methylated and unmethylated glioblastoma

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  • Frank Schwarm - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Justus- Liebig Universität Gießen, Gießen, Germany
  • Eberhard Uhl - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Justus- Liebig Universität Gießen, Gießen, Germany
  • Marco Stein - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Justus- Liebig Universität Gießen, Gießen, Germany
  • Marcus H. T. Reinges - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Justus- Liebig Universität Gießen, Gießen, Germany
  • Cornelia Weischer - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Justus- Liebig Universität Gießen, Gießen, Germany
  • Malgorzata Kolodziej - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Justus- Liebig Universität Gießen, Gießen, Germany

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie. 67. Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie (DGNC), 1. Joint Meeting mit der Koreanischen Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie (KNS). Frankfurt am Main, 12.-15.06.2016. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2016. DocMI.10.06

doi: 10.3205/16dgnc287, urn:nbn:de:0183-16dgnc2871

Published: June 8, 2016

© 2016 Schwarm et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. See license information at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

Outline

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Objective: HMGA 2 is a transcription factor associated with malignancy and poor prognosis in a variety of human cancers. In this study we investigated the HMGA 2 expression in methylated and unmethylated human glioblastomas and its prognostic value with regard to survival time of patients.

Method: In 44 glioblastoma patients and 5 non-tumorous brain specimens as controls HMGA 2 expression was determined by performing quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) and immunohistochemistry (IHC). Gene expression levels in MGMT methylated vs. unmethylated glioblatoma cells and between tumors and normal brain tissue, were compared using the Mann-Whitney U test. The relationship between HMGA 2 expression, progression-free-, and overall survival was analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier method and the log-rank test. P-values of <0.05 were considered as statistically significant.

Results: Patients' mean age at diagnosis was 57.4 ± 15.7 years. Median survival was 16 months (SE 2.8, 95% CI: 10.6-21.4). HMGA 2 gene expression was significantly higher in glioblastoma compared to normal brain tissue on qPCR (mean: 0.35, SD: 0.27 vs. 0.03, SD: 0.05) and IHC level (IRS mean: 17.21, SD: 7.43 vs. 3.20, SD:1.68) (p=0.001). Survival analysis in methylated patients (n=24) showed that high HMGA 2 levels are associated with a shorter median progression free survival compared to patients with low HMGA 2 expression (10.0 versus 21.0 months; p=0.14). Median overall survival time in patients with HMGA 2 overexpression was 20 months compared to 28 months in HMGA 2 low expression group (p=0.38). Unmethylated (n=18) patients with HMGA 2 overexpression showed no significant differences to the methylated group.

Conclusions: HMGA2 overexpression seems to be associated with a poor prognosis in glioblastoma patients. This protein may be an informative biomarker and prognostic factor independent of the MGMT promoter methylation status.