Reduced serum miR-98 predicts unfavorable clinical outcome of colorectal cancer

Y.-G. Wang, Q. He, S.-Q. Guo, Z.-Z. Shi

Department of Colorectal and Anal Surgery, Shanxi Provincial People’s Hospital, Taiyuan, Shanxi, China. dr_wangyonggang@126.com

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• Oncology

OBJECTIVE: Circulating microRNAs (miRNAs) are considered to be promising biomarkers for the diagnosis and prognosis prediction of cancers. However, the potential clinical significance of the serum miR-98 in colorectal cancer (CRC) remained unclear. This study aimed to examine the serum miR-98 levels in CRC patients and explore its potential value for CRC.

PATIENTS AND METHODS: A total of 115 CRC cases and 50 healthy volunteers were enrolled in this study. Quantitative reverse-transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) was performed to detect serum miR-98 expression in all the participants.

RESULTS: The results revealed that serum miR-98 levels were frequently downregulated in CRC patients compared with controls. In addition, low serum miR-98 levels were closely associated with aggressive clinical features and shorter survival. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis demonstrated that serum miR-98 could well differentiate CRC patients from healthy controls with relatively high accuracy. Multivariate analysis further demonstrated that serum miR-98 was an independent prognostic factor for both overall survival and disease-free survival. Mechanistically, MYC, IL-6, and HIST1H2BH were identified as direct downstream targets of miR-98 in CRC cells.

CONCLUSIONS: Collectively, serum miR-98 might be useful as an indicator for predicting the clinical outcome of CRC patients.

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