Article Sidebar
Main Article Content
Abstract
Background: Thymic epithelial tumors (TETs) are uncommon malignancies originating in the mediastinum, characterized by considerable histopathological diversity and variable clinical trajectories. Programmed Death-Ligand 1 (PD-L1), an immune checkpoint protein, is implicated in mechanisms of tumor immune evasion. This study aimed to investigate the correlation between PD-L1 immunoexpression and distinct histopathological types, as well as the Masaoka-Koga stage, in TETs.
Methods: This cross-sectional investigation analyzed 29 archival cases of TETs diagnosed between January 2019 and December 2024 at the Anatomical Pathology Laboratory of Dr. M. Djamil General Hospital Padang. Samples were procured via consecutive sampling from formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tumor tissues. Histopathological classification was reassessed according to the WHO 2021 criteria. PD-L1 expression was evaluated immunohistochemically and quantified using the Tumor Proportion Score (TPS). Masaoka-Koga staging was determined from clinical records. Statistical analysis of correlations was performed using the Chi-square test.
Results: PD-L1 immunoexpression was detected in the preponderance of cases. Low positive PD-L1 expression (TPS 1-49%) was observed in 82.8% of TETs, while high positive expression (TPS ≥50%) was noted in 10.3%. Thymic carcinoma constituted the most prevalent histopathological category (51.7%), and the majority of patients (91.7%) presented at an advanced Masaoka-Koga stage. Statistical analysis did not demonstrate a significant correlation between PD-L1 expression levels and histopathological type (p=0.195). Furthermore, no significant association was identified between PD-L1 expression and Masaoka-Koga stage (p=0.800).
Conclusion: This study indicated that while PD-L1 is frequently expressed in TETs within this cohort, its expression level did not exhibit a significant correlation with specific histopathological subtypes or the Masaoka-Koga clinical stage. Further investigations incorporating larger sample sizes are warranted to delineate the precise role of PD-L1 within the complex biological spectrum of thymic neoplasms.
Keywords
Article Details
As our aim is to disseminate original research article, hence the publishing right is a necessary one. The publishing right is needed in order to reach the agreement between the author and publisher. As the journal is fully open access, the authors will sign an exclusive license agreement.
The authors have the right to:
- Share their article in the same ways permitted to third parties under the relevant user license.
- Retain copyright, patent, trademark and other intellectual property rights including research data.
- Proper attribution and credit for the published work.
For the open access article, the publisher is granted to the following right.
- The non-exclusive right to publish the article and grant right to others.
- For the published article, the publisher applied for the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
