Kallikreins are a subgroup of serine proteases that are involved in the post-translational
processing of polypeptide precursors. Growing evidence suggests that many kallikreins
are implicated in carcinogenesis. Human kallikrein gene 7 (KLK7; HSCCE) is a new member
of the human kallikrein gene family. KLK7 is expressed in normal breast tissue and
is up-regulated in breast cancer cells by estrogens and glucocorticoids. In the present
study, expression of the KLK7 gene in 92 breast cancer tissues was analyzed by reverse
transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) and direct sequencing of several samples. The results were
correlated with other clinicopathological variables and patient outcome. KLK7 gene
expression was significantly lower in breast cancer patients of low stage (I/II) (p
= 0.011) and patients with positive progesterone receptors (p = 0.022). Survival analysis
showed that breast cancer patients with KLK7 positive tumors have relatively shorter
disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) than patients with KLK7 negative
tumors. These data suggest that KLK7 gene expression may be used as a marker of unfavorable
prognosis for breast cancer patients.
Keywords
KLK7 - hK7 - HSCCE - breast cancer - kallikrein - KLK - prognosis - tumor markers