Prognostic significance of lymphocyte proliferative responses to mitogens in gastric cancer patients.

In 501 Japanese patients with gastric cancer, the relationships between preoperative lymphocyte proliferative (LP) responses to mitogens and prognosis of patients were evaluated. Peripheral blood lymphocytes were cultured in the presence of either autologous or allogeneic serum and their LP responses to phytohemagglutinin (PHA) and pokeweed mitogen were investigated. An apparent inverse relationship between LP responses and stage of the disease was found in LP responses to PHA in the presence of autologous serum. The survival rate of patients with higher responses was significantly greater than those with lower responses, when LP responses to PHA in the presence of autologous serum served as the criterion. Probabilities of staging which were computed on the basis of LP response to PHA affirmed the reciprocal relationship between LP responses and stage of the disease. From these results, it is concluded that evaluation of LP responses may be a valuable tool in the assessment of the clinical stage and in the prediction of prognosis.