Soluble human leukocyte antigen-G expression in patients with ductal and lobular breast malignancy.

BACKGROUND Human leukocyte antigen-G (HLA-G) has been closely associated with diagnosis and prognosis in many types of human cancer. The current study aims to investigate soluble (s) HLA-G expression in patients with breast malignancy. PATIENTS AND METHODS sHLA-G plasma expression was determined in 120 patients with breast cancer and 40 healthy controls using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. RESULTS Plasma sHLA-G levels were significantly higher in breast cancer patients compared to healthy controls (p<0.001), with an area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of 0.735 (95% Confidence interval=0.630-0.841, p<0.001). Significantly increased sHLA-G expression was detected in patients with mixed type of coexisting ductal and lobular breast lesions, compared to patients with pure ductal carcinoma or pure lobular neoplasia (p<0.05). CONCLUSION sHLA-G expression is closely associated with the histological type of breast cancer. Our findings support the application of sHLA-G as a potential biomarker in body fluids for preoperative breast cancer detection and diagnosis.