Non-small cell lung cancer is the most frequently cause of cancer-related death in the world. To explore the technical feasibility, we detected aberrant promoter methylation of P16 in exhaled breath condensate which was a new, non-invasive tool for diagnosis and screening program of NSCLC.

We analyzed aberrant promoter methylation of P16 in 180 samples from 60 individuals, including 30 NSCLC patients (cancer tissues, adjacent normal lung tissues, blood plasma, and EBC), and 30 healthy controls (blood plasma and EBC) by fluorescent quantitative methylation-specific polymerase chain reaction (F-MSP).

The positive rate of aberrant promoter methylation of P16 was 26 of 30 (86.66%) in tumor tissues, 15 of 30 (50%) in blood plasma, and 12 of 30 (40%) in EBC, we have not observed the positive methylation of P16 in the adjacent normal lung tissues, or in EBC or blood plasma from the healthy control group.

We found that detected promoter methylation of P16 in EBC was feasibility, it should be an useful biomarker for diagnosis of NSCLC, it have potential prospect that detected the gene molecular in EBC because of noninvasive, specificity, convenient and repeatable.