Aim: In this study, the correlation between the circulating tumor cells (CTCs), clinical and pathological status, Beclin1 expression, and the prognosis of patients with renal cell carcinoma were studied.
Methods: The patients with renal cancer were tested every 3 months for 2 years, and once every 6 months after 2 years by using CanPatrol-ITMCTCs detection technology. The expression of Beclin1 in different types of CTCs was detected. The study investigated the correlation between Beclin1 expression of patients with different gender, age, tumor pathological stage, clinical stage, and postoperative metastasis.
Results: A total of 199 renal cancer patients were included in this study, and the patients underwent CTCs testing ranging from 1 to 10 times. There are 936 epithelial CTCs, 2,884 mixed CTCs, and 1,218 interstitial CTCs were detected. The results show that there are statistical differences between the three subtypes (P = 0.001). The cell count of the Beclin1 negative group was statistically significantly higher than that of the positive group among the three subtypes from the first to the fourth test (P < 0.05). The first test results showed that age was negatively correlated with the number of CTCs (r = -0.204, P = 0.004). There are no differences in the overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) between the different numbers of CTCs and Beclin1 expression (all P values were > 0.05).
Conclusion: The expression of Beclin1 in epithelial and mesenchymal renal cell carcinoma reduces the number of CTCs produced. The age of the patient may affect the levels of CTCs in renal cell carcinoma.