The following is the summary of “Expression of PD-L1 through evolution phase from pre-invasive to invasive lung adenocarcinoma” published in the January 2023 issue of Pulmonary medicine by Zhou, et al.
The purpose of this study was to examine the possible association of the PD-L1 pathway with the early evolution of lung adenocarcinoma by evaluating the expression of programmed cell death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) from pre-invasive to invasive adenocarcinoma. Researchers analyzed PD-L1 expression in 1,123 lung tissue samples from patients with stage IA1-IA3 adenocarcinoma in situ (AIS), minimally invasive adenocarcinoma (MIA), and invasive adenocarcinoma (IAC). The tumor proportion score was used to categorize PD-L1 expression as < 1% (negative), ≥ 1%, positive (1%), or ≥ (50%) (strongly positive).
T stage, pathological subtype, adenocarcinoma grade, spread through air space (STAS), vascular invasion, lymphatic invasion, and driving genes were examined in connection to PD-L1 expression. In both AIS and MIA, PD-L1 expression was extremely low. However, lung adenocarcinoma PD-L1 expression is linked with tumor aggressiveness. At 7.22%, 11.29%, and 14.20%, PD-L1 positivity ranged from IA1 to IA3. With respect to PD-L1, the percentages of positivity ranged from 0.38% in IA1 to 3.70% in IA3. Adenocarcinoma of Grade 3, micropapillary, solid dominant subtype, squamous cell anaplastic, or vascular invasion were all related to high PD-L1 expression and a positive rate.
It appears that the PD-L1 positive rate is also rectified when the driven genes ALK, ROS-1, and KRAS are used. Lung adenocarcinoma diagnosed at an early stage is more likely to exhibit an invasive growth pattern and a poor pathological subtype or biological behavior if PD-L1 is overexpressed. The progression from atypical in situ (AIS) to invasive adenocarcinoma (IAC) in lung adenocarcinoma may include the PD-L1 pathway.
Source: bmcpulmmed.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12890-023-02310-0