Prognostic and Predictive Significance of Eukaryotic Elongation Factor 1D (eEF1D) in Breast Cancer: A Potential Marker of Response to Endocrine Therapy

Components of the protein synthesis machinery are subjected to alterations in cancer cells. eEF1D gene, which lies within the frequently amplified 8q24 locus, is one of the subunits of the human eukaryotic elongation factor complex. This study aimed to evaluate the prognostic and predictive significance of eEF1D in breast cancer using in silico analysis tools. For this purpose, we analyzed genomic alterations of the eEF1D gene using TCGA datasets via cBioPortal. Histopathological analysis was performed on patient tissue images obtained from cBioPortal and the Human Protein Atlas. Survival analysis was carried out using the KM Plotter and the prediction of response to therapy was assessed via the ROC Plotter. We found that eEF1D was highly amplified and overexpressed in breast invasive carcinoma. Increased expression of eEF1D was correlated with increased structural disorganization and morphological alterations at the cellular level, as well as a shorter period of overall survival. Furthermore, prediction of response to therapy showed that patients with eEF1D overexpression responded significantly better to endocrine therapy. In conclusion, our results suggest a cancer-promoting role for eEF1D, associated with poor prognosis and points towards its predictive value in providing better tailored treatment options for a patient.