Expression of TIM-3 in tumor microenvironment of colon cancer and its correlation with clinicopathological features

Objective To investigate the expression of T cell immunoglobulin mucin 3(TIM-3) in tumor microenvironment of colon cancer and its correlation with clinicopathological features. Methods The study selected 57 patients with colorectal cancer who were treated from March 2013 to May 2015 in Zhejiang Taizhou Hospital. Immunohistochemistry was used to detect the expression of TIM-3 in colorectal cancer tissues and adjacent tissues of these patients. The correlation between the expression of TIM-3 and the clinicopathological features of patients with colorectal cancer and the relationship between the expression of TIM-3 and the follow-up survival were analyzed. Results The weak and strong expression of TIM-3 were 35.09% and 64.91% respectively in colorectal cancer, 71.93% and 28.07% respectively in adjacent tissues, and the strong expression percentage of TIM-3 in tumor was significantly higher than that in adjacent normal tissues (P<0.05). In colon cancer tissues, the strong expression of TIM-3 was significantly correlated with histological classification, tumor stage and lymph node metastasis (all P<0.05), but not with gender, age and tumor size (all P>0.05). The survival rate of colon cancer patients with weak expression of TIM-3 in tumor tissue was significantly better than that of patients with strong expression of TIM-3 in tumor tissue (P<0.05). Conclusion The expression of TIM-3 in the tumor microenvironment of colon cancer is highly correlated with histological classification, tumor stage and lymph node metastasis, and the survival of patients with high expression of TIM-3 is poor after operation. The expression of TIM-3 may be one of the potential prognostic indicators of patients with colon cancer.