Expression, clinicopathologic, and prognostic significance of MMP15 in operable pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma

Objective: Matrix metalloproteinase 15 (MMP15) has been previously reported to be involved in many cancers. However, its expression pattern in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) remains contradictory. In addition, its clinicopathologic and prognostic significance in this malignancy has not been elucidated. Methods: Expression of MMP15 was immunohistochemically detected in a tissue microarray of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded samples from 95 patients of PDAC after surgery. Its expression pattern and relations with clinicopathologic factors and disease-specific survival (DSS) were then evaluated. Finally, its expression and prognostic value were measured in the on-line publically available database, GEPIA, using TCGA data. Results: In comparison of all samples and 75 paired ones, MMP15 expression in tumor tissues was all significantly higher than that in para-tumor ones (P = .037 and .016). Furthermore, tumoral MMP15 expression was associated with peri-neural invasion. Survival analysis showed that patients with high tumoral MMP15 expression had significantly poorer DSS than those with low MMP15 expression (P = .0059). In univariate and multivariate Cox regression tests, tumoral MMP15 expression was all significantly predictive for DSS. In the on-line publically available GEPIA database, MMP15 was also overexpressed in PDAC, but was not found to be prognostic. Conclusion: Our results indicated that MMP15 expression was elevated in operable PDAC and might have a prognostic impact.