Expression of survivin and of antigen detected by a novel monoclonal antibody, T332, is associated with outcome of diffuse large B-cell lymphoma and its subtypes.

Although diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) is the most common type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, it is both clinically and morphologically heterogenous. The present study investigates the significance of survivin and a novel monoclonal antibody (MAb), T332, immunohistochemically for predicting the prognoses of DLBCL and its subtypes classified as germinal center B-cell-like type (GCB) and non-GCB type (NGCB) based on the expression profiles of CD10, bcl-6, and MUM1. A total of 60 cases of DLBCL (GCB, n = 22; NGCB, n = 38) were examined for the expression of survivin and T332 antigen. Survivin(+) DLBCL had a significantly worse prognosis (P = 0.01) than survivin(-) cases, as already reported, while survivin(+) GCB or NGCB tended to have poor prognoses (P = 0.06 and 0.07, respectively). However, T332(+) DLBCL and NGCB had significantly more unfavorable prognoses than T332(-) cases (P = 0.01 and 0.02, respectively) while there was no significant survival difference between the T332(+) and T332(-) groups of GCB (P = 0.11). Interestingly DLBCL coexpressing survivin and T332 (n = 13) had a significantly worse prognosis (P = 0.009) than the remaining single positive and double negative cases (n = 31). In conclusion, survivin and the novel MAb, T332, might be a good predictor of DLBCL and its subtypes.