Nanomagnetic bead-based nucleic acid isolation to examine the correlation of serum TRAP1 and MDSC levels with clinical treatment efficacy and prognosis in nonsmall cell lung cancer

To explore the correlation of tumor necrosis factor receptor-associated protein (TRAP1) and myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) in peripheral blood with clinical treatment efficacy and prognosis in nonsmall-cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The study cohort comprised 112 patients with NSCLC who were treated between March 2020 to December 2022, including 45 and 67 patients with stage I–II and III–VI NSCLC, respectively, and 90 healthy individuals as controls. Peripheral blood samples of study participants before and after chemotherapy were collected. Serum MDSC and TRAP1 levels were compared in patients categorized according to the NSCLC stage by nanomagnetic bead-based separation method. Flow cytometry was used to further analyze the expression levels of MDSCs and TRAP1 in cells before and after chemotherapy in patients with NSCLC. Chemotherapy efficacy was evaluated according to the World Health Organization objective evaluation criteria for tumor efficacy, and the relationship of chemotherapy efficacy with serum MDSC and TRAP1 levels was analyzed. Multivariate Cox regression analysis was conducted to evaluate factors associated with prognosis. The serum levels of TRAP1 and MDSCs were significantly higher in patients with NSCLC than in healthy controls ( P <0.05). Serum TRAP1 and MDSC levels were positively correlated with TNM stage. Serum levels of TRAP1 and MDSCs after chemotherapy were significantly lower than those before chemotherapy in the overall cohort, serum levels of TRAP1 after chemotherapy were significantly lower than those before chemotherapy in patients with partial response, and serum levels of MDSCs after chemotherapy were significantly higher than those before chemotherapy in patients with progressive disease ( P < 0.05). Multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed that high serum levels of TRAP1 and MDSCs were associated with poor prognosis. Serum levels of TRAP1 and MDSCs should be considered as potential predictive biomarkers for chemotherapy efficacy and prognosis in NSCLC.