Evaluation of Involvement of Axillary Lymph Nodes with Ki-67 Expression in Patients with Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is the first leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women. Ki-67 is being used for evaluation of the prognosis of patients with breast cancer. The aim of the current study was to explore the association of the involvement of axillary lymph nodes status with the expression of Ki-67 in patients with breast cancer. A total of 449 patients were enrolled followed by evaluation of the association of Ki67 levels with demographic, pathologic, and survival data of patients, using Chi-square, logistic regression models, student t test and Mann-Whitney. We observed a significant relationship between the expression level of Ki-67 and stage of tumor (P = 0.012), positive progesterone receptor (P = 0.003), and subtype pathologic features (P < 0.05). Also, a significant difference was detected between Her2 and expression level of Ki-67 (P = 0.015). Survival analysis showed the association for Ki-67 (P = 0.02), age (P = 0.005), stage of tumor (P < 0.05), lymph node involvement (P = 0.001), and the Her2 (P = 0.024) with clinical outcome (e.g., overall survival or disease free survival) of patients with breast cancer. The results of this study demonstrated that the overexpression of Ki-67 was associated with large tumors, progesterone receptor expression, and stage of tumor, but it was not related with lymph node involvement.