Suebwong ChuthapisithBeverley E. BeanGerard CowleyJennifer M. EreminSrila SamphaoRobert LayfieldIan D. KerrJanice WisemanMohamed El-SheemyThiagarajan SreenivasanOleg EreminMahidol UniversityUniversity of NottinghamLincoln County Hospital2018-09-132018-09-132009-05-01European Journal of Cancer. Vol.45, No.7 (2009), 1274-1281095980492-s2.0-64349091540https://repository.li.mahidol.ac.th/handle/20.500.14594/27237Neoadjuvant chemotherapy is used in women who have large or locally advanced breast cancers. However, up to 70% of women who receive neoadjuvant chemotherapy fail to achieve a complete pathological response in their primary tumour (a surrogate marker of long-term survival). Five proteins, previously identified to be linked with chemoresistance in our in vitro experiments, were identified histochemically in pre-treatment core needle biopsies from 40 women with large or locally advanced breast cancers. Immunohistochemical staining with the five proteins showed no single protein to be a predictor of response to chemotherapy. However, pre-treatment breast cancer specimens that were annexin-A2 positive but annexin-A1 negative correlated with a poor pathological response (p = 0.04, Fisher's exact test). The mechanisms by which annexins confer chemoresistance have not been identified, but may be due to inhibition of apoptosis. Annexin-A1 has been shown to enhance apoptosis, whilst annexin-A2, by contrast, inhibits apoptosis. © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Mahidol UniversityBiochemistry, Genetics and Molecular BiologyMedicineArticleSCOPUS10.1016/j.ejca.2008.12.026