Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Higher metallothionein levels linked to better survival in dog
By Cardoso, Sérgio Vitorino et al.·Published in Oncology reports·2004·School of Dentistry, Brazil·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Immunohistochemical staining of metallothionein in canine mammary tumors: better survival with higher expression.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A group of 15 dogs with mammary tumors was studied to see how a protein called metallothionein (MT) affected their survival. Unlike in humans, where higher levels of MT are linked to worse outcomes, dogs with higher MT levels actually had better survival rates. This suggests that the role of MT in tumors may be different in dogs compared to humans. More research is needed to understand why this difference exists, but the findings offer hope for dogs diagnosed with mammary tumors.
People also search for: dog mammary tumor prognosis · canine cancer survival rates · metallothionein in dogs
Abstract
Metallothioneins (MT) are small proteins able to strongly bind and therefore neutralize heavy-metal, free-radical and other genotoxic compounds. A close relationship between MT and zinc-finger motif-dependent transcription factors has also been shown, with implications on cell proliferation and survival. Human malignant neoplasms (e.g. breast cancer) usually present worse prognosis with increased MT content. We therefore evaluated the immunohistochemical expression of MT in a group of 15 canine mammary gland tumors. There was no relationship between MT immunostaining and histological type or malignancy grading of the lesions. Comparison of MT immunolabelling with the overall survival of the animals revealed that MT overexpression was related to better prognosis, a contrasting finding with the human counter-part. We considered that differential MT gene expression could be responsible for this variation, as observed for some human neoplasms of distinct embryonic origin, but further investigation is required to elucidate this topic.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15547757/