Delta-like Protein 3 Expression and Targeting in Merkel Cell Carcinoma.

CONCLUSIONS: DLL3 overexpression is very common in MCC by IHC. The response to treatment suggests that DLL3 expression may have predictive relevance for DLL3-targeting therapies in MCC.
IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: Delta-like protein 3 (DLL3) is being developed as a predictive biomarker to identify patients for treatment with DLL3-targeting agents. Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is an aggressive neuroendocrine carcinoma of the skin. We found that DLL3 overexpression is very common in MCC by immunohistochemistry and significantly associated with Merkel cell polyomavirus expression. Despite the lack of prognostic significance in this cohort, DLL3 expression may have predictive relevance for DLL3-targeting therapies in MCC. The high levels of DLL3 expression in a subset of MCC may potentially be used to select patients to receive DLL3-targeting therapies.
PMID: 32372416 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Source: The Oncologist - May 4, 2020 Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: Xie H, Kaye FJ, Isse K, Sun Y, Ramoth J, French DM, Flotte TJ, Luo Y, Saunders LR, Mansfield AS Tags: Oncologist Source Type: research