Background/aims: For patients with metastatic colorectal cancer, both FOLFOX regimen and FOLFIRI regimen are considered as first-line choices. There are no clinically useful markers that could predict the response to these regimens respectively. We aimed at identifying serum protein patterns which could predict the efficacy of chemotherapy.
Methodology: Serum from 70 patients diagnosed as metastatic colorectal cancer before first-line chemotherapy were collected and analyzed for protein patterns using ANN analysis of SELDI-TOF-MS. Among the 70 cases, 44 patients received FOLFOX chemotherapy, while the other 26 patients received FOLFIRI chemotherapy. After four cycles of the treatment, RECIST criteria were used to define the responders (R) and non-responders (NR).
Results: A potential predicting pattern consisting of 6 biomarkers was identified in the patients receiving FOLFOX chemotherapy. Using this predicting pattern, the responders could be separated from the non-responders with a sensitivity of 92.9% and a specificity of 81.3%. Another potential predicting pattern that consisted of 7 bio-markers was identified in the patients who have received FOLFIRI chemotherapy. The sensitivity and the specificity of this predicting pattern were 92.3% and 92.3% respectively.
Conclusions: Two potential pat-terns for the prediction of efficacy of FOLFOX or FOLFIRI chemotherapy were established in this preliminary study.