Background: Recently, many studies have explored the relationship between the expression of programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) and prognosis in gastric cancer, but there is still controversy. Additionally, few studies have specifically investigated the expression of PD-L1 in patients with peritoneal metastasis.
Methods: Immunohistochemistry was used to analyze the expression of PD-L1 in gastric cancer patients with peritoneal metastasis. The combined positive score (CPS) was calculated to evaluate the expression of PD-L1, and the clinicopathological data were analyzed to explore prognostic significance.
Results: In total, 147 gastric cancer patients with peritoneal metastasis were enrolled. The negative PD-L1 expression was defined as a CPS < 1, and high PD-L1 expression was defined as a CPS ≥ 10. PD-L1 expression with CPS ≥ 1 and CPS-negative was detected in 67 (45.58%) and 80 (54.42%) patients, respectively. High PD-L1 expression at PD-L1 CPS ≥ 10 was detected in 21(14.29%) patients. The median overall survival (OS) was 18.53 months in the CPS < 10 group and 27.00 months in the CPS ≥ 10 group; the OS difference between the two groups was significant (p = 0.015). Multivariate analysis demonstrated that a poor Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance score (ECOG PS) (p = 0.002) and severe peritoneal metastasis (p = 0.033) were significantly associated with poor survival, while palliative chemotherapy (p = 0.002) and high PD-L1 expression (p = 0.008) were independent and significantly favorable prognostic factors.
Conclusions: Our study demonstrated that PD-L1 expression was widely presented in gastric cancer patients with peritoneal metastasis, while a CPS no less than 10 predicted better prognosis.
Keywords: PD-L1; gastric cancer; peritoneal metastasis; prognosis.