Haptoglobin Proved a Prognostic Biomarker in Peripheral Blood of Patients with Personalized Peptide Vaccinations for Advanced Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer

抄録

Haptoglobin (Hp) is a well-known acute-phase protein that possibly has influence on tumors through the immune response. This study was conducted to evaluate the correlation between Hp expression and the effect of treatment by cancer peptide vaccines in advanced castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) patients. Hp expression was measured by RT-PCR using peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) collected from advanced CRPC patients, who were divided into two groups: long-term survivors and short-term survivors. Before cancer peptide vaccination (pre-vaccination), Hp expression was almost same in the two groups, but after cancer peptide vaccination (post-vaccination), Hp expression was higher in short-term survivors, suggesting that Hp expression in the PBMCs increased in short-term survivors after treatment by cancer peptide vaccines. Our results suggest that Hp expression level in the PBMCs can serve as a prognostic biomarker in treatment by cancer peptide vaccine in advanced CRPC patients.