The expression of epidermal growth factor receptor 1 and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 based on tumor location affect survival in gastric cancer

To investigate the different expression of epidermal growth factor receptor 1 (EGFR) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) in gastric cancer based on tumor locations and its impact on patients survival. Gastric cancer is heterogeneous disease, recent years have established a molecular classification and described distribution of molecular subtypes in stomach. However, the difference of EGFR and HER-2 expression among tumor location is still unknown. Between January 2010 and August 2014, 2477 consecutive patients with gastric cancer were treated in our surgery department. The tumor locations were classified into 4 groups: cardia, fundus, corpus, and antrum. Based on tumor locations, the clinicopathologic characteristics, EGFR and HER-2 expression, and follow-up data were analyzed by univariant analysis and Kaplan-Meier analysis retrospectively. There were difference of gender, age, Borrmann type, pathological type, differentiation, T-stage, tumor size, gastrectomy method, and complications among the locations. The positive rate of EGFR expression in fundus was 18.18%, which was lower than cardia (46.21%), corpus (43.62%), and antrum (48.83%) (P < .001). The 5-year survival rate in EGFR positive patients was 50.8%, which was significantly lower than EGFR negative patients (64.0%, P = .021). The positive rate of HER-2 expression in cardia was 48.15%, which was significantly higher than fundus (37.5%), corpus (35.45%), and antrum (38.54%) (P = .009), but HER-2 expression did not correlate with 5-year survive (P = .548). Our results suggest that there exist difference of EGFR and HER-2 expression based on tumor locations, and the distribution of EGFR impact on patients survival. Emphasizing the role of EGFR and HER-2 in the context of location contribute to make appropriate treatment strategy and improve prognosis of gastric cancer.