Summary
Background
Previous studies from our group had identified c-myc oncoprotein expression as an
important prognostic parameter in a series of retrospective studies of primary and
metastatic melanoma and other variants of this disease. This study set out to prospectively
evaluate the prognostic significance of c-myc positivity in a consecutive series of
primary melanomas presenting at Mount Vernon Hospital Regional Plastic Surgery and
Burns Centre.
Methods
A consecutive series of 117 primary melanomas underwent flow cytometric analysis for
c-myc expression at diagnosis. Routine clinical and histological parameters were collected
from each patient's clinical records and survival assessed. The mean follow up was
45 months.
Results
Kaplan–Meier survival analysis demonstrated that Breslow depth, histogenic subtype,
ulceration, age and sex had prognostic significance. Survival analysis revealed high
c-myc positivity to be significantly associated with poorer outcome (P<0.043). Each of the main prognostic parameters were assessed for their independent
significance using Cox Proportional Hazards; only c-myc retained independent significance
(P<0.039).
Conclusions
The strength of this study is that it was performed in a consecutive series of patients
followed up in a longitudinal prospective study. c-myc was not the strongest predictor
of survival in univariate analysis, but was the only parameter that retained significance
in multivariate analysis.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: January 31, 2007
Accepted:
November 9,
2006
Received:
May 15,
2006
Footnotes
☆Work presented at BAPS Scientific Meeting, Dublin, July 2004.
Identification
Copyright
© 2006 British Association of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
