The Association of the BRAF V600E Mutation with Clinicopathologic Characteristics in Chinese Population with Conventional Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma

Abstract Objective:The aim of the study is to evaluate the association of the BRAFV600E mutation with the clinicopathologic characteristics in Chinese population with papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC).MethodsA total of 943 PTC patients who underwent thyroidectomy from 2014 to 2016 at Henan Provincial People’s Hospital were included in the present study. The BRAFV600E mutation was examined in each resected specimen by quantitative Real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) technique. Results The PTC patients were subclassified into the overall, PTC>10mm and papillary thyroid microcarcinoma(PTMC) groups. The positive rate of BRAFV600E mutation was 85.4% in Chinese patients with PTC. In both overall PTC and PTC> 10mm groups, the BRAFV600E mutation was much more frequently detected in elderly patients and patients at T1 stage (P< 0.05). In addition, the positive rate of BRAFV600E mutation was significantly higher in PTC patients without concomitant Hashimoto’s thyroiditis in overall PTC and PTMC groups (P< 0.05). Furthermore, logistic regression analysis suggested that the risk of having a larger tumor diameter was increased by 6-fold when BRAFV600E mutation in the PTMC group. No association between the BRAFV600E mutation and other clinicopathologic factors was observed. ConclusionThe BRAFV600E mutation was significantly associated with patients age and T stage. Furthermore, the risk of having a larger tumor size was significantly increased when BRAFV600E mutation in the PTMC group. which suggests that BRAFV600E mutation might play an important role in the activation of early thyroid carcinogenesis, the effect might weaken in the progression of PTC.