Back to 2016 Annual Meeting

BACKGROUND: Breast cancer is one of the most common malignancies in women. Autologous fat grafting is widely used for reconstruction following breast conserving surgery for breast cancer. Adipose-derived stem cells (ASCs) in fat grafts may play a role in soft tissue regeneration. To date, there are no data on proliferation or differentiation rates of ASCs from patients treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC). Our goal is the evaluate ASC characteristics from adipose tissue adjacent to the cancerous (CA-ASC) and noncancerous (N-ASC) breasts with or without neoadjuvant chemotherapy. METHODS: Human ASCs were isolated from fat specimens from the cancerous (CA-ASC) and the noncancerous side (N-ASC) in patients with breast cancer. Of the 21 patients, 11 received neoadjuvant chemotherapy. ASCs were cultured in M199 medium with 10% FBS. Proliferation rates were measured by constructing growth curves during a 10-day period. The adipogenic differentiation capability was analyzed by Oil-Red-O staining and quantitative RT-PCR. Rates and differentiation were compared using ANOVA for repeated measures on rank transformed data. RESULTS: ASC yield between both the CA-ASC and N-ASC was comparable (p=0.25). Cell proliferation rates between CA-ASC ± NAC and N-ASC ± NAC were comparable (p = 0.85 and p = 0.50, respectively). There was no significant difference in Oil-Red-O absorbance or gene expressions of PPAR-ᵧ and LPL between CA-ASC ± NAC and N-ASC ± NAC. CONCLUSIONS: ASCs isolated from CA-ASC and N-ASC with or without NAC have similar proliferation rates, cell yield, and adipogenic differentiation capabilities. These data support the use of autologous fat grafting in breast cancer patients who are undergoing reconstructive surgery after receiving NAC. ASC function does not appear to be impaired after NAC in this ex vivo study.