Abstract 3412: Prognostic significance of plasma ghrelin in patients with gastric cancer

Background: Different prognosis observed for patients of the same clinical stage in gastric cancer, emphasizes the fact that new biological prognostic factors are needed to complement clinical staging. We aimed to investigate the prognostic significance of plasma ghrelin in gastric cancer patients. Methods: In this prospective study, we included 83 gastric cancer patients from Cancer institute of Tehran, Iran. All the patients were candidates for gastrectomy with or without preoperative neoadjuvant chemotherapy (PNC). The patients were followed for three years. Demographic, clinical and para clinical data were registered. Using an ELISA based assay plasma levels of total and active ghrelin were assessed prior to and one week after the operation. Univariate and multivariate COX analyses were used to investigate the independent predictors of patients overall survival. Results: The mean (±SD) age of the patients was 60.3±13.6. Sixty-five (78.3%) patients were male. Majority of the patients had gastric adenocarcinoma (95.2%). Thirty-seven (44.6%) patients had TNM stage II or I. Poorly differentiated grade was detected in 29 (34.9%) of the patients. Forty-eight (57.8%) patients received PNC before the operation. Mean (±SD) survival was 529 ± 373 days. Mean level of the plasma total ghrelin was 269.8±268.7 and 108.7±91.2 (pg/ml) before and after the operation, respectively (P