Analysis of expression and prognostic significance of vimentin and the response to temozolomide in glioma patients

Gliomas are the most common primary intracranial malignant tumors in adults. Surgical resection followed by optional radiotherapy and chemotherapy is the current standard therapy for glioma patients. Vimentin, a protein of intermediate filament family, could maintain the cellular integrity and participate in several cell signal pathways to modulate the motility and invasion of cancer cells. The purpose of the present research was to identify the relationship between vimentin expression and clinical characteristics and detect the prognostic and predictive ability of vimentin in patients with glioma. To determine the expression of vimentin in glioma tissues, paraffin-embedded blocks from glioma patients by surgical resection were obtained and evaluated by immunohistochemistry. To further investigate the association of vimentin expression with survival, we employed mRNA expression of vimentin genes from the Chinese Glioma Genome Atlas (CGGA) and the GSE 16011 dataset. Kaplan-Meier analysis and Cox regression model were used to statistical analysis. We detected positive vimentin straining in 84 % of high-grade compared to 47 % in low-grade glioma patients. Additionally, vimentin mRNA expression was correlated with glioma grade in both CGGA and GSE16011 dataset. Patients with low vimentin expression have longer survival than high expression. In multivariate analysis, vimentin was an independent significant prognostic factor for high-grade glioma patients. We also identified that glioblastoma patients with low vimentin expression had a better response to temozolomide therapy. Vimentin expression has a significant association with tumor grade and overall survival of high-grade glioma patients. Low vimentin expression may benefit from temozolomide therapy.