Neutrophil elastase (NE), a typical hematopoietic serine protease, has significant roles in inflammatory and immune responses, and thus is highly associated with various diseases such as acute lung injury (ALI) and lung cancer.
Perioperative administration of neutrophil elastase inhibitor appeared to be safe; however, it could not prevent the development of acute exacerbation after surgery in lung cancer patients with IIPs.
Lung cancer tumors contain tumor-associated macrophages (TAM) and neutrophils, which release the serine proteases neutrophil elastase (NE) and proteinase 3 (P3) into the tumor microenvironment.
Non-MM variants of AAT and ELA2 genotypes with predicted intermediate or high activity could also represent a risk factor for aggressive form of lung cancer associated with extrathoracic metastases.
Our best-fitting model showed significant and independent effects of the PI1-deficient allele (odds ratio [OR], 2.0; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.4 to 3.0) and the ELA2 T-G haplotype (OR, 4.1; 95% CI, 1.9 to 8.9) on lung cancer risk, and an increased risk (OR, 2.6; 95% CI, 2.4 to 2.8) for individuals carrying both a PI1-deficient allele and a G-G haplotype
A significant increase in lung cancer risk was observed for expected high NE activity genotypes (OR=3.2, 95% CI=1.02-10.3) as compared to low NE activity genotypes.