Combined mRNA expression levels of members of the urokinase plasminogen activator (uPA) system correlate with disease-associated survival of soft-tissue sarcoma patients

Table 3 Multivariate Cox regression analysis for the association of relevant clinical and histomorphological parameters, and of uPA, PAI-1, uPAR-wt and uPAR-del4/5 mRNA levels with disease-associated survival in the subgroup of STS patients with complete tumor resection (R0)

Factor	No. cases^a	RR (95% CI)^b	P
Histological subtype^c
LS	15	1
MFH/ FS	11	0.76 (0.1-8.0)	0.820
RMS/ LMS	15	0.37 (0.1-3.3)	0.381
NS	4	7.79 (0.2-240.1)	0.240
Syn	6	5.30 (0.4-76.4)	0.219
Tumor stage
I	12	1
II	19	0.80 (0.1-17.2)	0.889
III	16	10.97 (0.7-160.8)	0.080
IV	4	347.3 (13.6-8869.8)	<0.001
Tumor localization
Extremities	35	1
Trunk wall	6	1.08 (0.1-8.7)	0.939
Head/neck	2	7.44 (0.5-101.8)	0.133
Abdomen/retroperitoneum	8	2.23 (0.3-18.4)	0.454
uPA mRNA^{d, e}
Low	17	1
High	35	3.53 (0.7-16.8)	0.114
PAI-1 mRNA^{d, e}
Low	17	1
High	35	6.55 (1.0-44.5)	0.054
uPAR-wt mRNA^{d, e}
Low	17	1
High	35	2.66 (0.5-14.4)	0.260
uPAR-del4/5 mRNA^{d, e}
Low	17	1
High	34	6.00 (0.8-47.1)	0.088

^aTotal number of cases: n = 52, the number of cases for uPAR-del4/5 is 51.
^bRR: hazard ratio (95% confidence interval) of multivariate Cox regression analysis.
^cAbbreviations: LS - liposarcoma, MFH - malignant fibrous histiocytoma, FS - fibrosarcoma, RMS - rhabdomyosarcoma, LMS - leiomyosarcoma, NS - neurogenic sarcoma, Syn - synovial sarcoma.
^dRelative mRNA expression ratio of the respective marker / HPRT divided into groups using the 33% percentile; Low: 0 - 33% percentile; High: > 33% - 100% percentile.
^eFactors were added separately to the base model of relevant clinical prognostic factors in STS patients including the histological subtype, tumor stage and tumor localization.

ISSN: 1471-2407