Publication:

Clinical relevance of MMP-9 in terms of neoplasm growth, invasion and metastasis in thyroid, breast and colorectal cancer

Background Cancer cells invade and metastasis commonly. This poses challenge in cancer management. MMP-9 can be clinically useful to predict the prognosis of the patients. Objective was to study clinical relevance of MMP-9 in terms of neoplasm growth, invasion and metastasis in Thyroid, Breast and Colorectal cancer.

Methods A hospital based cross sectional study was carried out in Department of General Surgery, Kamineni Institute of Medical Sciences, Narketpally for a period of two years. A total of 30 cases of carcinoma cases were studied. Out of these carcinoma cases, 10 were of gastrointestinal malignancy, 10 were of thyroid malignancy and 10 were of breast carcinoma.

Results For breast carcinoma, maximum cases were in the age group of 46-50 years (40%), for thyroid carcinoma, maximum cases were seen in the age group of more than 55 years (40%), for colo-rectal carcinoma, maximum cases were above the 50 years of age. For breast carcinoma, maximum cases were in stage III B (70%), for thyroid carcinoma, in III stage (60%) and for colo-rectal carcinoma, in Dukes C1 stage (60%). In breast cancer the positivity of MMP-9 was 66.7% in stage IIIA and it increased to 85.7% in stage IIIB. For thyroid cancer the positivity increased from 33.3% in stage III to 75% for stage IV A. In case of colo-rectal cancer, the positivity of MMP-9 expression increased from 66.7% for stage Dukes C 1 to 75% in stage Dukes C2 stage. Thus, for all types of carcinoma, the expression of MMP-9 increased with advancement of the stage.

Conclusions MMP-9 is a gelatinase which degrades extra cellular matrix and helps in tumor spread. It is expressed more in advanced stages of the malignant disease. It correlates with prognosis of the patient.