Correlation analysis of miR-200b, miR-200c, and miR-141 with liver metastases in colorectal cancer patients

S.-H. Zhu, X.-C. He, L. Wang

Department of Traditional Chinese Medicine Surgery, the First People’s Hospital of Shangqiu City, Henan, China. xingchanghe123@sina.com

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• Oncology

OBJECTIVE: To investigate correlation relationship between serum miR-200b, miR-200c, miR-141 levels with liver metastases in colorectal cancer patients.

PATIENTS AND METHODS: A total of 85 colorectal cancer patients with liver metastases and 54 colorectal cancer patients without liver metastases were divided into experimental group and control. Serum sample was collected before surgery and tested by Real-time PCR to evaluate miR-200b, miR-200c, miR-141 expressions.

RESULTS: The primary site of cancer of two groups was mostly derived from the colon cancer among the control and experimental group (there was no significant difference between the control group (61.1%) and experimental group (63.5%). Most of the invasive depth in the control group was T3 phase (50%), and most of the invasive depth in the experimental group was T4 phase (69.4%); therefore, the difference of the invasive depth between the control and experimental group is significant (p < 0.05). The majority of cases in experimental group were in stage IV, while they were in stage II in control. MiR-200b, miR-200c and miR-141 relate with tumor metastasis through epithelial mesenchymal transition (ETM) pathway, and target ZEB1 and ZEB2 genes. MiR-200b, miR-200c, and miR-141 have been confirmed to be related to tumor metastasis. miR-141 levels in serum from experimental group was higher significant compared to control group (p = 0.024). miR-200b levels in serum from experimental group was significantly increased compared to control group (p = 0.031). The miR-200c levels in serum from experimental group were significantly higher compared to control group (p = 0.015). Meanwhile, serum miR-141, miR-200b, miR-200c abnormal expressions in serum were related to tumor occurrence and development. Their levels were positively correlated with liver metastasis.

CONCLUSIONS: The probability of liver metastases in colorectal cancer patients was positively correlated with serum miR-141, miR-200b, and miR-200c expressions, which could be treated as new biomarker for early diagnosis of liver metastases in colorectal cancer.

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