Prognostic Significance of HER3 Expression in Patients with Cervical Cancer

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Human epidermal growth factor receptors (HER) are involved in important signaling pathways such as cell growth, proliferation, and cell death. HER3 overexpression is associated with poor prognosis in various tumors, but prognostic relevance of HER3 in cervical cancer was not studied. We analyzed HER3 expression in cervical cancer tissue using immunohistochemistry (IHC) and compared disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) based on HER3 expression. The presence of the HER3 protein was linked to a poor prognosis in cervical cancer. DFS and OS were linked to lymph node metastasis, histology, and HER3 protein expression. HER3 expression was connected to poor DFS and OS in both low- and high-risk groups of cervical cancer patients. We suggest that HER3 IHC testing might be a useful method for recognizing cervical cancer patients who are likely to progress. ABSTRACT: HER3 has been recognized to have an oncogenic role in various types of cancer. However, its prognostic significance has not been elucidated in cervical cancer. The aim of this study was to investigate the prognostic significance of HER3 expression in cervical cancer using immunohistochemistry (IHC). HER3 immunohistochemical staining was performed on the tumor tissue samples of 336 cervical cancer patients. The association between the clinicopathological characteristics and patient survival analysis was assessed according to HER3 expression. HER3 IHC staining was positive in 31.0% (104/336) of the cervical cancer patients. A higher proportion of adeno-/adenosquamous carcinoma was observed in the HER3-positive group (34.6%) than in the HER3-negative group (18.8%). In survival analysis, HER3 expression was significantly associated with poorer disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) (p < 0.001 and p = 0.002, respectively). Multivariate analysis also indicated that HER3 expression was an independent prognostic factor for DFS (hazard ratio (HR) = 2.58, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.42–4.67, p = 0.002) and OS (HR = 3.21, 95% CI, 1.26–8.14, p = 0.014). HER3 protein expression was a poor prognostic factor of survival in patients with cervical cancer. This finding could help to provide individualized management for these patients.