The effect of folate-related SNPs on clinicopathological features, response to neoadjuvant treatment and survival in pre- and postmenopausal breast cancer patients.

This study aimed to investigate the relationship of ten single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the MTHFR, MTR, MTRR, DHFR, MTHFD1, TS, RFC1 and DNMT3b genes with cancer survival, therapeutic response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy and clinicopathological characteristics in 300 pre- and postmenopausal breast cancer patients of a Russian Western Siberian population. We found that the MTHFR 677CT genotype as well as combination of MTHFR 677CT and 677TT genotype was related to tumor size and estrogen-positive status in postmenopausal group. The RFC1 80А allele was associated with an increased risk of lymph node metastases among postmenopausal women. The MTHFR 677TT genotype was significantly correlated with a better progression-free survival in premenopausal patients. In contrast, a worse outcome was observed in this group patient with MTHFD1 1958AA genotype. In the multivariate analysis, the MTHFD1 1958AA genotype was identified as an independent prognostic factor for premenopausal breast cancer survival. Our findings provide evidence for associations of breast cancer survival with folate-related SNPs in a population of Western Siberian region of Russia and the MTHFD1 (1958G>A) may have additional prognostic value especially among premenopausal patients.