Integrated clinico-molecular profiling of appendiceal adenocarcinoma reveals a unique grade-driven entity distinct from colorectal cancer

BACKGROUND: Appendiceal adenocarcinoma (AA) is an orphan disease with unique clinical attributes but often treated as colorectal cancer (CRC). Understanding key molecular differences between AA and CRC is critical. METHODS: We performed retrospective analyses of AA patients (N = 266) with tumour and/or blood next-generation sequencing (NGS) (2013–2018) with in-depth clinicopathological annotation. Overall survival (OS) was examined. For comparison, CRC cohorts annotated for sidedness, consensus molecular subtypes (CMS) and mutations (N = 3283) were used. RESULTS: Blood-NGS identified less RAS/GNAS mutations compared to tissue-NGS (4.2% vs. 60.9%, P < 0.0001) and showed poor concordance with tissue for well-/moderately differentiated tumours. RAS (56.2%), GNAS (28.1%) and TP53 (26.9%) were most frequent mutations. Well/moderately differentiated tumours harboured more RAS (69.2%/64.0% vs. 40.5%) and GNAS (48.7%/32.0% vs. 10.1%) while moderate/poorly differentiated tumours had more TP53 (26.0%/27.8% vs. 7.7%) mutations. Appendiceal adenocarcinoma (compared to CRC) harboured significantly fewer APC (9.1% vs. 55.4%) and TP53 (26.9% vs. 67.5%) and more GNAS mutations (28.1% vs. 2.0%) (P < 0.0001). Appendiceal adenocarcinoma mutation profile did not resemble either right-sided CRC or any of the four CMS in CRC. High grade, but no mutation, was independently predictive of survival. CONCLUSION: Integrated clinico-molecular profiling of AA identified key molecular drivers distinct from CRC. Appendiceal adenocarcinoma has a predominantly grade-driven biology that trumps mutations.