{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.034740545294635, 'fraction_numerical': 0.022867194371152155, 'mean_word_length': 4.603448275862069, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
Cancer-associated thrombosis in patients with pancreatic cancer and its correlation with plasma tissue factor level: A Japanese prospective cohort study

Abstract Background Cancer-associated thrombosis (CAT) is a well–known complication of cancer, especially pancreatic cancer. One possible cause of CAT is secretion of tissue factor (TF)-positive extracellular vesicles from cancer cells. The previous cohort of Western countries showed that patients (pts) with a high level of TF tended to develop CAT with 20–40% incidence in pancreatic cancer. This prospective cohort study aimed to assess the efficacy of TF level for predicting the incidence of CAT in Japanese pts with pancreatic cancer. Methods We registered consented 197 pts from June 2013 to November 2016, who had pathologically confirmed pancreatic cancer and no history of treatment for the current disease. Plasma samples were collected from pts at the time of registration, 3, 6, and 12 months after. The TF level was evaluated using the Quantikine® ELISA kit (R&D systems) as we found that TF levels in multiple cancer cell lines evaluated using this kit correlated well with those analyzed by western blotting experiments. We estimated the positive (PPV) and negative predictive values (NPV) for the incidence of CAT by using obtained plasma TF levels (cutoff value: 100 pg/ml) and D-dimer levels (cutoff value: 1.2 μg/ml). Results Of all the patients, 189 patients were with unresectable disease. The median of the initial level of TF for these pts was 47.8 pg/ml (range: 0.0—318.7). The incidence of CAT was observed in 13 pts (6.6%) at the median follow-up time of 325 days. The median TF level at the time of registration was 148.5 pg/ml in CAT+ group and 53.5 pg/ml in CAT- group with a p–value of  1.2 µg/ml, NPV by TF  Conclusions Present study revealed that the incidence of CAT in Japanese pts was lower than that of Western countries. It was also found that TF levels alone could not predict CAT observed in Japanese pts with pancreatic cancer: however, TF levels were found to contribute to high NPV even in pts with a high level of D–dimer. Legal entity responsible for the study The authors. Funding Has not received any funding. Disclosure All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.