Clinicopathological significance of decreased galectin-3 expression and the long-term prognosis in patients with breast cancer.

Purpose: Galectin-3 expression is modulated in cancer cells, and that finding has led to the recognition of galectin-3 as a diagnostic or prognostic marker for various cancers, including breast cancer. This study investigated the correlation between galectin-3 expression and the clinicopathological features in patients with breast cancer, in order to determine the relevance and role of galectin-3 in breast cancer progression.

Methods: Galectin-3 expression was investigated immunohistochemically in 116 patients with breast cancer, and a statistical analysis was performed.

Results: Galectin-3 expression in breast cancer was significantly associated with tumor vascular invasion. However, galectin-3 expression was not associated with Ki-67 expression, which reflects tumor proliferation. Disease-free survival and long-term overall survival were significantly shorter for patients with reduced galectin-3 expression.

Conclusions: This study demonstrated that the galectin-3 expression was associated with tumor vascular invasion and metastasis, suggesting that galectin-3 plays a critical role in tumor progression via an invasive mechanism but not via proliferation in breast cancer. Furthermore, reduced expression of galectin-3 is useful for predicting a long-term poor prognosis in patients with breast cancer.