BTRE is a type of epilepsy, induced by the abnormal discharge of intracranial tumor itself or its mass effect caused by abnormal discharge of nerve cells around the lesion1. Seizures are one of the clinical symptoms of brain tumors, so patients can also present with disorders of consciousness, limb movement, sensory and autonomic nervous function23-25. Seizures are often seen in patients with brain tumors and occur at different rates. However, there is no clear conclusion on the pathogenesis and pathophysiology of BTRE, and, there is no single theory that can explain the cause of BTRE. Thus, the mechanism of BTRe is a relatively complex and multi-factor seizure26-29.
Seizures and the use of antiepileptic drugs can lead to cognitive impairment, affect the long-term quality of life of patients and the curative effect of brain tumor, which would also affect patients' family harmony, bad working condition, low moods27. Patients with BTRE present a complex therapeutic profile and require a unique and multidisciplinary approach. They, in fact, must face two different pathologies at the same time, brain tumor and epilepsy. In brain tumor patients, the presence of epilepsy is considered the most important risk factor for long-term disability30-31. The problem of the proper administration of medications and their potential side effects is of great importance, because good seizure control also has a significant impact on the patient's psychological and relational sphere31. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the mechanism of BTRE in order to better predict, prevent and control the occurrence of epilepsy. With the progress of research methods and technologies, BTRE has been deeply explored, especially in terms of its pathogenesis and the corresponding brain neural network. However, there is still a lack of sufficient attention and systematic research on the pathogenesis, clinical diagnosis and treatment of BTRE. At present, few studies have focused on the molecular neuropathologic correlation of glioma with tumor-related epilepsy32, beside several studies on the association between WHO classification, IDH1 mutation in BTRE of patients with low-grade glioma33-35. Therefore, in order to better define the etiology of tumor-related epilepsy in glioma patients, our study focused on the correlation between molecular neuropathic indicators and BTRE in low and high glioma patients, which was expected to clarify the pathogenesis of glioma patients with BTRE and benifit glioma patients.
To our knowledge, this is the first systematic retrospective study to investigate the correlation between molecular neuropathology and different grades glioma patients with BTRE. In the 186 glioma patients, the results showed that patients aged over 40 years old and low WHO grade were significantly correlated with BTRE. We identified one histopathological type and three molecular pathological characteristics that were specifically associated with BTRE: diffuse astrocytoma, IDH-wild type, low Ki-67 proliferation index, negative ATR-X expression and IDH-1 positive mutation status. Ki67 PI and ATR-X were independent correlation factors for a higher incidence of preoperative seizures. Future research should focus on identifying susceptibility candidate genes for BTRE in larger multicenter studies, including low- and high-grade gliomas with and without symptomatic seizures.
Previous studies have showed that age, sex, tumor location, histopathological type and WHO grade were the influencing factors of glioma with BTRE, although the results of various reports were inconsistent33,36-37. In our study, there is no agreement on the influence of age, sex and histopathological type on the occurrence of epilepsy. There was study showed that the risk was higher in men than in women, and the risk of seizure decreased with age. However, the results varied among different histopathological types38. Previous studies showed that the most common gliomas associated with epilepsy were diffuse astrocytoma, oligodendroglioma, and pleomorphic xanthoastrocytoma39. According to the WHO Classification, 2016 edition40, glioma are classified as diffuse gliomas (astrocytoma, oligodendroglioma, glioblastoma), as well as circumscribed and low-grade gliomas (angiocentric glioma, pilocytic astrocytoma, subependymal giant cell astrocytoma, pleomorphic xanthoastrocytoma, pilomyxoid astrocytoma, ependymoma, myxopapillary ependymoma, and subependymoma). Some study results showed that most patients with angiocentric glioma were children and young people, with no significant gender difference, and epilepsy was the main clinical manifestation41. Diffuse astrocytoma and oligodendroglial tumors were common in the cerebral hemisphere of young patients (frontal and temporal lobes were common), and epilepsy was one of the most common clinical symptoms42. These results showed that low-grade gliomas were more common in young adults, and were more common in supratentorial frontal and temporal lobes, with no gender difference and epilepsy was one of the main clinical symptoms. However, the previous studies were not entirely consistent with our findings. Our statistical results showed that BTRE was higher in male glioma patients than in female patients, but the results were not statistically significant. The incidence of BTRE in glioma patients older than 40 years was higher than that in glioma patients younger than 40 years, and the results were statistically significant. In addition, the most common histological types of BTRE in our study were diffuse astrocytoma, IDH-wildtype, followed by oligodendrogastrocytoma, NOS, Glioblastoma, IDH-wildtype and diffuse astrocytoma, IDH-mutant. The relationship between the location of the glioma and BTRE risk has been controversial. Gliomas can occur in any part of the brain. However, frontal, temporal, parietal gliomas are the most likely to be associated with BTRE, while occipital and supratentinal gliomas are less likely to have BTRE39. Our results showed that BTRE was most likely to occur in gliomas involving the frontal lobe and multiple lobes. Frontal lobe, temporal lobe, parietal lobe are closely related to human language, consciousness, and motor functions. Lesions in these areas could cause abnormal discharge of these brain functional areas, leading to epilepsy. If the glioma invades the cortical functional area, the incidence of epilepsy will be higher. However, statistical results showed that the occurrence of BTRE was not statistically significant in relation to the location of the tumor, which was different from previous studies43. The reasons for the different statistical results may be related to differences in study design, the different populations and the complex mechanism of BTRE, and the results of individual research centers could be different.
Previous studies also showed that seizures were more common in low-grade gliomas than in high-grade gliomas1,3. The results were similar to those in our study, which showed that BTRE was present in lower grade gliomas at 62.5% and in higher grade gliomas at 37.5%. This may be related to the faster growth rate of high-grade glioma, which will cause severe ischemic and hypoxic damage to the surrounding tissues and tumor tissues themselves, making them less likely to form epileptogenic foci. Other studies had suggested that high grade gliomas release excessive amounts of the neuroexcitatory transmitter glutamate, which was neurotoxic and could lead to neuronal death in large quantities, so high-grade gliomas were less likely to have seizures44. Some studies also believed that the rapid growth of high-grade gliomas destroyed the brain's electrical transmission network. However, low-grade glioma had a slow growth rate and little influence on the surrounding tissues, presenting gradual degeneration, causing partial cortex afferent nerve block, leading to high sensitivity of demulsification, and promoting the formation of epileptogenic foci15,45. At present, the correlation and mechanism of BTRE in different WHO grades glioma mainly focus on the destruction of the blood-brain barrier, gene mutations, changes in neurotransmitters and receptors, and changes in ion concentration. In addition, some studies also showed that cellular inflammatory factors were involved in the occurrence and development of BTRE in glioma46-47. Despite numerous studies, the mechanism of BTRE in different grades gliomas is still unclear and needed further research.
IDH is a member of the α-hydroxyacid oxidative decarboxylase family. IDH mainly acts on the tricarboxylic acid cycle to make isocitrate into α-ketoglutaric acid, while the IDH mutation could make isocitrate into 2-hydroxyglutaric acid (2-HG), and the altered reaction is also known as the weakening of alpha-ketoglutaric acid, which increases the level of 2-HG48. The IDH mutation was first identified in low-grade glioma patients, which was an early event in gliomagenesis and has significant implications for glioma progression and tumor behavior49. Previous study showed that mutation of the IDH gene occurred in ~80% of lower-grade (WHO grade II and grade III) gliomas50. Mutant IDH produces (R)-2-hydroxyglutarate, which induces DNA hypermethylation and presumably drives tumorigenesis, also suggests that 2-HG plays an important role in the occurrence and development of epilepsy. Due to 2-HG structurally similar to glutamate, IDH1 mutant glioma cells release a large number of 2-HG will combine multiple neurons and activate receptors, such as NMDAR and AMPAR, causing the influx of sodium ion, potassium ion and calcium ion, and increasing the action potential triggered by neurons, then damaging the balance between inhibition and excitation of neurons, thus causing abnormal excitation of neurons and promoting the occurrence of epilepsy51. Therefore, the incidence of BTRE in IDH1 mutant glioma patients is much higher than that in IDH1 wild-type patients. Our study showed that the IDH1 positive mutation rate of glioma patients with epilepsy was 23.4%, which was different from IDH1 negative mutation in NO BTRE group (13.9%), and the difference was statistically significant, which suggested that IDH1 positive mutation was closely related to BTRE in glioma patients. Moreover, our study also showed that IDH1 mutation was more likely to occur in diffuse astrocytoma patients.
In our study, we have identified two important molecular pathological characteristics associations with BTRE in glioma patient, which were Ki-67 PI and ATR-X expression. Tumor-correlated biomarkers in glioma patient with BTRE have been a popular research topic for decades, however, they have not traditionally enjoyed as much attention as more malignant brain tumor. In recent years, a number of developments have been achieved towards further understanding of the molecular and developmental backgrounds of glioma patient with BTRE, which helps to clarify the mechanism of glioma leading to epileptic seizures. There were several studies showed that a number of candidate genes that cause seizures in glioma patients, like the interleukin-1β (IL-1β)52, CD3453, tuberous sclerosis complex (TSC) 54and et al. Molecular genetic effects may alter the balance between intracortical inhibitory and excitatory mechanisms, therefore inducing epileptogenic activity. However, the molecular mechanism underlying the BTRE remain largely unknown, and there still have issue on whether BTRE in glioma patients results from localized epileptic foci that lead to abnormal circuits or from molecular defects. Ki-67 was a protein found in the nucleus of a cell. Ki was discovered in the 1980s in Kiel, Germany, and the number 67 comes from the experiment number. The researchers found a strong link between the amount of this protein and the cell's division cycle; the higher the positive rate of ki67, the higher the proportion of cells in the proliferative cycle and the faster the tumor growth55. At present, ki67 has become a very important indicator to judge the activity level of tumor cells. The association between ki67 and BTRE in glioma patients has been rarely studied and the results were inconsistent56. One study showed that the ki67 proliferation index was not associated with the risk of epileptic seizures in glioma patients57. However, some studies have also proved that ki-67 significantly affected seizure prognosis58, and related with BTRE in glioma by increasing proliferation59. These results indicated that ki67 may play a role in epilepsy in glioma patients. As we know, Low ki-67 PI is usually associated with benign tumors or low grade glioma(WHO grade I, II), and our study already showed that WHO grade I or II was associated with BTRE in glioma patients(table 2), which supports our hypothesis that it could increased incidence of preoperative seizures in glioma patients. In our study, low ki67 proliferation index was clearly associated with BTRE in glioma, with statistical significance. Of course, the results of this study cannot be taken as the final result, and the correlation between ki67 proliferation index and epilepsy in glioma patients needs further study. ATR-X gene is a pathogenic gene of α thalassemia/mental retardation syndrome X-linked located on the X chromosome, and plays an important role in chromatin remodeling, genome and maintenance of telomere stability60. Mutations in ATR-X have been identified in multiple tumor types. In 2011, Heaphy et al. found that ATR-X gene mutation existed in tumors of the central nervous system, and a series of subsequent studies confirmed that ATR-X gene mutation mainly occurred in diffuse astrocytoma61; In 2014, the consensus of the International Society of Neuropathology considered the deletion of ATR-X gene as a characteristic molecular marker of diffuse astrocytoma62. In 2016, the WHO integrated IDH, TERT, 1P19Q and other molecular markers into the histopathological diagnosis of glioma, promoting the accurate diagnosis of glioma40. Under the guidance of molecular typing, accurate treatment of glioma has been a hot research topic in recent years. ATR-X gene mutation can be used as a prognostic indicator for glioma patients. However, the association between ATR-X and epilepsy in glioma patients has not been described. Our study showed that compared with the epilepsy group, glioma patients with ATR-X gene mutation in the non-epileptic group were less likely to develop epilepsy, which was statistically significant. In this study, positive expression of ATR-X gene in glioma patients was significantly negatively correlated with tumor concurrent epilepsy (p<0.05),which was shown to be an independent predictor for preoperative seizures in glioma patients, a finding that has not been previously reported, and the mechanism needs to be confirmed by further research. Therefore, we speculate that Ki-67 and ATR-X may become the novel diagnostic or therapeutic targets for tumor-related epilepsy in glioma in the future.
In our study, we did not find that glioma patients with tumors of different lobes, positive or negative expression of olig-2 and CD34 were significantly likely to present with epilepsy. These results differ from previous studies and may be due to differences in the number of cases, methods, and mechanisms involved53. In addition, some limitations should be presented as follows. First, the project design of small sample (N=186) and single center cannot produce effective results. Second, there were only 64 glioma patients had epilepsy, leading to a relatively limited power. Thus, the adjustment in logistic regression may be too extensive. Third, there were no data for other molecular, like p53, EGFR amplification, 1p/19q deletion, which should be clarified their correlation with BTRE in glioma patients. Thus, further studies are needed to provide more evidence to identify molecular markers related in glioma with BTRE.
In summary, this cohort study was performed new molecular pathologic indicators in glioma patients with BTRE. Low WHO grade, glioma patients over 40 years old, IDH1 positive mutation, as well as low ki67 proliferation index and ATR-X negative expression can predict the likelihood of epilepsy occurring in glioma patients. Thus, some of these factors will be worthy of further research as a possible therapeutic target, which may provide insights into developing a more thorough understanding of the pathogenesis of epilepsy and aim to improve the long-term remission rate of epilepsy before and after surgery.