Plasma YKL-40 in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer treated with first line oxaliplatin-based regimen with or without cetuximab: RESULTS from the NORDIC VII Study.

We aim to test the hypothesis that high plasma YKL-40 is associated with short progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) treated with first-line oxaliplatin and 5-flourouracil with or without cetuximab.A total of 566 patients in the NORDIC VII Study were randomized 1∶1∶1 to arm A (Nordic FLOX), arm B (Nordic FLOX + cetuximab), or arm C (Nordic FLOX + cetuximab for 16 weeks followed by cetuximab alone as maintenance therapy). Pretreatment plasma samples were available from 510 patients. Plasma YKL-40 was determined by ELISA and dichotomized according to the age-corrected 95% YKL-40 level in 3130 healthy subjects.Pretreatment plasma YKL-40 was elevated in 204 patients (40%), and median YKL-40 was higher in patients with mCRC than in healthy subjects (age adjusted, P