Clinical importance of serum secreted clusterin in predicting invasive breast cancer and treatment responses

Enhanced serum secreted clusterin (sCLU) protein was associated with progression, poor prognosis and chemotherapy sensitivity evaluation in malignant patients. However, the clinical significance of serum sCLU protein levels in patients with invasive breast cancer (IBC) is unknown. In this study, the serum sCLU protein in 2648 patients with IBC was detected. The diagnostic value and treatment responses of serum sCLU protein in patients with IBC were also performed. The results showed that the serum sCLU protein level was significantly higher in IBC patients compared to the healthy controls (P < 0.0001), and strongly correlated with higher clinical tumor stage (P < 0.001), lymph node metastasis (P < 0.001), shorter overall survival (OS) (P = 0.032) and disease-free survival (DFS) (P = 0.029), respectively. Using the cutoff value of 18.46 μg/mL, the sensitivity and specificity were 86.26% and 73.46% to separate IBC patients from noncancerous and healthy controls. The postoperative patients showed lower serum sCLU levels compared to the preoperative patients (P = 0.003). The chemoresistant patients showed higher serum sCLU levels compared to the chemosensitive patients (P < 0.001). These data indicated that serum sCLU levels are effective indicators for diagnosis and chemotherapy sensitivity evaluation in patients with IBC.