TP53 mutation in malignant breast tumors: association with risk factors and clinical-pathological characteristics, including risk of death, in patients from Rio de Janeiro

Breast cancer is the leading cause of death due to cancer among women in Brazil and, the State of Rio de Janeiro presents the highest mortality coefficient of this disease in the country. Studies have shown that many genetic and molecular factors may be related to the outcome of cases. The aim of this study was to describe the frequency and types of mutations in the tumor suppressor gene TP53 in 120 patients with diagnosis of invasive breast carcinoma recruited from the Instituto Nacional de Câncer (INCA), Rio de Janeiro from1995 to 1997, and to analyze the associations between these mutations and risk factors, and tumor characteristics, including the presence of TP53 mutations, and risk of death. The molecular analysis detected TP53 alterations in 22 cases (18.3%), of which 2 cases presented 2 mutations each; a polymorphism in exon 6 was observed in 1 case. The mutations found were: 14 missense, 2 nonsense, 2 silent, 2 deletions, 1 insertion and 3 located in introns which probably did not change the protein. The analysis of risk factors in relation to TP53 mutations showed that only tobacco consumption had an association (adjusted OR = 0.24 (0.06-0.88)). Multivariate analysis showed that only tumor aggressiveness showed an OR indicative of risk (3.98, IC 95% 1.25-12.72).These results are in agreement with previous studies, which report that the presence of TP53 mutations may indicate more aggressive breast tumors biologically although this is not the only parameter to be considered.

Gene TP53; Breast cancer; Risk factors; Tumor characteristics