Tumour PD-L1 expression in small-cell lung cancer: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Authors

Emmanuel Acheampong, Edith Cowan UniversityFollow
Afaf Abed, Edith Cowan UniversityFollow
Michael Morici, Edith Cowan UniversityFollow
Samantha Bowyer
Benhur Amanuel, Edith Cowan UniversityFollow
Weitao Lin, Edith Cowan UniversityFollow
Michael Millward
Elin S. Gray, Edith Cowan UniversityFollow

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Title

Cells

Volume

9

Issue

11

Publisher

MDPI

School

School of Medical and Health Sciences

RAS ID

32387

Funders

Edith Cowan University Cancer Council of Western Australia

Comments

Acheampong, E., Abed, A., Morici, M., Bowyer, S., Amanuel, B., Lin, W., ... Gray, E. S. (2020). Tumour PD-L1 expression in small-cell lung cancer: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Cells, 9(11), article 2393. https://doi.org/10.3390/cells9112393

Abstract

: Antibodies against programmed death-1 (PD-1), and its ligand, (PD-L1) have been approved recently for the treatment of small-cell lung cancer (SCLC). Although there are previous reports that addressed PD-L1 detection on tumour cells in SCLC, there is no comprehensive meta-analysis on the prevalence of PD-L1 expression in SCLC. We performed a systematic search of the PubMed, Cochrane Library and EMBASE databases to assess reports on the prevalence of PD-L1 expression and the association between PD-L1 expression and overall survival (OS). This meta-analysis included 27 studies enrolling a total of 2792 patients. The pooled estimate of PD-L1 expression was 26.0% (95% CI 17.0-37.0), (22.0% after removing outlying studies). The effect size was significantly heterogeneous (I2 = 97.4, 95% CI: 95.5-98.5, p < 0.0001).Positive PD-L1 expression was a favourable prognostic factor for SCLC but not statistically significant (HR = 0.86 (95% CI (0.49-1.50), p = 0.5880; I2 = 88.7%, p < 0.0001). Begg's funnel plots and Egger's tests indicated no publication bias across included studies (p > 0.05). Overall, there is heterogeneity in the prevalence of PD-L1 expression in SCLC tumour cells across studies. This is significantly moderated by factors such as immunohistochemistry (IHC) evaluation cut-off values, and assessment of PD-L1 staining patterns as membranous and/or cytoplasmic. There is the need for large size, prospective and multicentre studies with well-defined protocols and endpoints to advance the clinical value of PD-L1 expression in SCLC.

DOI

10.3390/cells9112393

Related Publications

Acheampong, E. (2022). Assessment of circulating tumour cells in lung cancer patients. https://ro.ecu.edu.au/theses/2554

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