TROY expression is associated with pathological stage and poor prognosis in patients treated with radical cystectomy

BACKGROUND: New biomarkers may help us provide individualized prognosis and allow risk-stratified clinical decision making about radical treatment. OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to determine the tumor necrosis factor of receptor superfamily 19 (TROY) expression in urothelial carcinoma and its relationship to clinicopathological findings. METHODS: Immunohistochemical staining for TROY was carried out in 136 archival radical cystectomy specimens with immunoreactivity being stratified on a 0-9 scale. Expression scores for TROY were further stratified into negative (score 0) and positive (score 1 or greater). Median age was 65 years, and the median follow-up period was 50.7 months. RESULTS: Expression of TROY was significantly associated with the pathological stage (p= 0.019) and expression of nestin (p= 0.013). Log-rank tests indicated that expression of TROY was significantly associated with disease progression and cancer-specific mortality (p= 0.044 and 0.008, respectively). In multivariate Cox regression analysis, lymph node status was the only independent prognostic factor for disease progression and cancer-specific survival. Expression of TROY was a marginal prognostic factor for cancer-specific survival. CONCLUSIONS: TROY may therefore be a new molecular marker to aid in identifying and selecting patients undergoing radical cystectomy who could potentially benefit from multimodal treatment.