Patent ID: 7588895

Claim:
A method of diagnosing, or providing a prognosis for, oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma metastasis or extracapsular spread of an oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma in a human subject having the carcinoma, the method comprising the steps of: (a) contacting a biological sample comprising RNA wherein the sample is from the primary cancer site of the oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma with i) a CTTN reagent that specifically binds to a CTTN marker nucleic acid consisting of the nucleic acid sequence of SEQ ID NO:19, wherein said contacting with the CTTN reagent is used to determine the expression level of a CTTN marker nucleic acid in the sample; ii) a MMP9 reagent that specifically binds to a MMP9 marker nucleic acid having the nucleic acid sequence of SEQ ID NO:27, wherein said contacting with the MMP9 reagent is used to determine the expression level of a MMP9 marker nucleic acid in the sample; and iii) an EGFR reagent that specifically binds to an EGFR marker nucleic acid consisting of the nucleic sequence of SEQ ID NO:31, wherein said contacting with the EGFR reagent is used to determine the expression level of an EGFR marker nucleic acid in the sample; and (b) determining whether or not RNA representing each of the CTTN, MMP9, and EGFR marker nucleic acids is overexpressed in the sample when compared to, respectively, RNA expression levels representing each of the CTTN, MMP9, and EGFR marker nucleic acids of a comparison population of human subjects having a tongue squamous cell carcinoma which did not metastasize; wherein the overexpression of the RNA representing each of the CTTN, MMP9, and EGFR marker nucleic acids in the sample indicates that the metastasis or extracapsular spread is present or likely to develop.