未经选择的乳腺癌患者队列中 TIL（肿瘤浸润淋巴细胞）的预后价值

Tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) are considered to have prognostic and predictive value for patients with early breast cancer.

We examined 1166 breast cancer patients from a prospective, multicentre cohort (Prognostic Assessment in Routine Application (PiA), n = 1270, NCT01592825) following recommendations from the International TILs Working Group. TIL quantification was performed using predefined groups and as a continuous variable in 10% increments. The primary objective was the distribution of TILs in different breast cancer types. The second objective was the association with the recurrence-free interval (RFI) and overall survival (OS). Stromal infiltration with more than 60% TILs appeared in 2% of hormone receptor (HR)-positive and HER2-negative tumours, in 9.

8% of HER2-positive tumours (any HR) and 19. 4% of triple-negative breast cancers (TNBCs). Each 10% increment was associated with an improvement in the prognosis in HER2-positive samples (RFI, hazard ratio 0. 773, 95% CI 0. 587-1. 017; OS, hazard ratio 0. 700, 95% CI 0. 523-0. 937).

When defining exploratory cut-offs for TILs, the use of a 30% threshold for the HR-positive and HER2-negative group, a 20% threshold for the HER2 group and a 60% threshold for the TNBC group appeared to be the most suitable. TILs bore prognostic value, especially in HER2-positive breast cancer. For clinical use, additional research on the components of immune infiltration might be reasonable.