TY - JOUR T1 - Pathological Significance and Prognostic Role of WWC1 in Upper Urinary Tract Urothelial Cancer JF - Anticancer Research JO - Anticancer Res SP - 2311 LP - 2317 DO - 10.21873/anticanres.15710 VL - 42 IS - 5 AU - HIROKI KURATA AU - KENSUKE MITSUNARI AU - TSUBASA KONDO AU - MASAHITO MASATO AU - HIDENORI ITO AU - YUTA MUKAE AU - YUICHIRO NAKAMURA AU - TOMOHIRO MATSUO AU - KOJIRO OHBA AU - YASUSHI MOCHIZUKI AU - HIDEKI SAKAI AU - YASUYOSHI MIYATA Y1 - 2022/05/01 UR - http://ar.iiarjournals.org/content/42/5/2311.abstract N2 - Background/Aim: WW and C2 domain-containing 1 (WWC1) protein is a suppressor of malignancies. However, there is no information on the pathological significance of WWC1 in upper urinary tract cancer (UTUC). Patients and Methods: In this study, WWC1 immunoreactivity was investigated in 152 non-metastatic UTUC samples. The relationships between WWC1 expression and grade, pT stage, proliferative index (using an antibody to Ki-67), and the immunohistochemical expression of matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-2 and -9 were evaluated. Results: WWC1 expression was negatively associated with tumor grade and pT stage (p<0.001). Positive expression of WWC1 was a better predictor of the UTUC recurrence and subsequent metastasis, and the multivariate analysis showed that WWC1 expression was a significant predictor of subsequent metastasis (hazard ratio=0.29, p=0.020). WWC1 expression inversely correlated with the proliferative index (odds ratio=2.59, p=0.023) and expression of MMP9 (odds ratio=2.19, p=0.040) but not with MMP2 expression, by multivariate analyses. Conclusion: WWC1 expression was negatively associated with malignant aggressiveness via the suppression of cancer cell proliferation and MMP9 expression in patients with UTUC. This suggests WWC1 to be a useful predictor and novel therapeutic target in patients with UTUC. ER -