MAGE-A family serves as poor prognostic markers and potential therapeutic targets for epithelial ovarian cancer patients: a retrospective clinical study.

Objective: The aim of our study is to investigate the expression pattern and prognostic significance of melanoma-associated antigens-A (MAGE-A) family in primary epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) patients. Study design: The expression of MAGE-A family members, including MAGE-A1, -A2, -A3, -A4, -A6, -A10 and -A12 was immunohistochemically detected in 82 cases of primary EOC and 10 cases of pericarcinoma ovarian tissues. The association between MAGE-A family expression and the clinicopathological parameters as well as the prognosis of primary EOC patients was analyzed. Results: MAGE-A family expressed in 48.8% of primary EOC tissues, but not expressed in pericarcinoma ovarian tissues. MAGE-A expression was associated with the pathological types, FIGO stage, and pre-operative serum CA125 level. Overall survival of EOC patients with positive MAGE-A family expression was significantly shorter than those patients with negative MAGE-A expression. Multivariate analysis showed that although MAGE-A family expression can affect the overall survival, it was not an independent prognostic marker for EOC patients. Conclusions: Molecular assessment of MAGE-A family members could be helpful to improve the prognostic evaluation and to provide a new potential therapeutic target for primary EOC patients.