Detection of disseminated tumour cells in the liver of colorectal cancer patients

Aims The aim of this study was to assess the incidence and lobar distribution of three surrogate tumour cell markers in biopsies from both liver lobes. Patients and methods This study comprised 189 patients for whom DNA and/or RNA was available from both liver lobes and who showed at least one positive marker in one liver lobe. Detection of cytokeratin 20 (CK20) and guanylylcyclase C (GCC) was performed by nested reverse transcription-PCR. For detection of K-ras mutations in codons 12 and 13, a PCR-restriction-fragment-length-polymorphism assay was used. Results The incidence of all markers and their combinations was higher in the smaller left lobe than in the larger right lobe (CK20: 62 vs 38%; GCC: 52 vs 48%; K-ras: 61 vs 39%; CK20+GCC: 61 vs 39%; CK20+GCC and/or K-ras: 61 vs 39%). The marker incidence in the two liver lobes was independent from the location of the respective primary colorectal carcinoma. Conclusions The markers CK20, GCC, and K-ras indicating cells shed from the primary CRC were detected more often individually and in combination in biopsies from the smaller left lobe than from the larger right lobe. The site of the primary tumour did not influence the marker incidence in both liver lobes.