Prognostic Significance of MicroRNA-375 Downregulation in Solid Tumors: A Meta-Analysis.

[esophageal carcinoma]

Objective . Recently , many studies have shown that microRNAs (miRNA ) exhibit altered expression in various cancers and may play an important role as prognostic biomarker of cancers . We performed a meta -analysis to evaluate the impact of miR-375 expression in solid tumors on patients ' overall survival (OS ). Methods . Studies were identified by searching PubMed , Embace , and Cochrane Library (last search update was in May 2014 ) and were assessed by further quality evaluation . The pooled hazard ratios (HRs ) with 95 % confidence intervals (CIs ) for total and stratified analyses were calculated to investigate the association between miR-375 expression and cancer patients OS . Results . Our analysis results indicated that downregulation of miR-375 predicted poor OS (HR = 1 .91 , 95 % CI 1 .48 -2 .45 , P < 0 .001 ). Subgroup analyses showed that lower expression of miR-375 was significantly related with poor OS in patients with esophageal carcinoma (HR = 2 .24 , 95 % CI 1 .69 -2 .96 , P < 0 .001 ) and non-small -cell lung cancer (NSCLC ) (HR = 1 .71 , 95 % CI 1 .31 -2 .24 , P < 0 .001 ). Conclusions . The findings from this meta -analysis suggest that miR-375 expression is associated with OS of patients with malignant tumors and could be a useful clinical prognostic biomarker .