Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jun 14, 2015; 21(22): 6884-6891
Published online Jun 14, 2015. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v21.i22.6884
Downregulation of microRNA-382 is associated with poor outcome of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma
Bo Qi, Jian-Guo Lu, Wen-Jian Yao, Ting-Min Chang, Xiu-Guang Qin, Ying-Hua Ji, Tian-Yun Wang, Shang-Guo Liu, Han-Chen Li, Yu-Zhen Liu, Bao-Sheng Zhao
Bo Qi, Jian-Guo Lu, Wen-Jian Yao, Xiu-Guang Qin, Shang-Guo Liu, Han-Chen Li, Yu-Zhen Liu, Bao-Sheng Zhao, Department of Thoracic Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Xinxiang Medical University, Weihui 453100, Henan Province, China
Ting-Min Chang, Department of Gastroenterology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Xinxiang Medical University, Weihui 453100, Henan Province, China
Ying-Hua Ji, Department of Oncology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Xinxiang Medical University, Weihui 453100, Henan Province, China
Tian-Yun Wang, Department of Molecular Biology, Xinxiang Medical University, Xinxiang 453003, Henan Province, China
Author contributions: Zhao BS contributed to conception and design; Qi B designed methods; Lu JG, Yao WJ, Chang TM, Qin XG and Ji YH performed the majority of the experiments; Wang TY carried out the laboratory experiments; Liu SG analyzed the data; Liu YZ interpreted the results and wrote the paper; and Li HC contributed to revision for intellectual content.
Supported by Xinxiang Medical University Key Areas grant, No. ZD2011-8 (to BS Zhao).
Ethics approval: All procedures involving human subjects were reviewed and approved by the Institutional Review Board of the First Affiliated Hospital of Xinxiang Medical University.
Institutional animal care and use committee: Institutional Review Board approval is not needed for this study since it does not involve any animals.
Conflict-of-interest: No potential conflicts of interest relevant to this article were reported.
Data sharing: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Bao-Sheng Zhao, MD, Professor, Chief, Department of Thoracic Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Xinxiang Medical University, 88 Jiangkang Road, Weihui 453100, Henan Province, China. zhaobscn@126.com
Telephone: +86-373-4404340 Fax: +86-373-4402573
Received: December 16, 2014
Peer-review started: December 17, 2014
First decision: January 8, 2015
Revised: February 8, 2015
Accepted: March 30, 2015
Article in press: March 31, 2015
Published online: June 14, 2015
Processing time: 184 Days and 1.8 Hours
Abstract

AIM: To study the potential prognostic role of microRNA-382 (miR-382) in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC).

METHODS: Forty six patients were divided into 2 groups according to postoperative survival time: the poor outcome group (28 patients), who showed early metastasis but no recurrence, and died within 1 year after surgery, 12 patients of the group received postoperative chemotherapy treatment that was given after early metastasis happening; the good outcome group (18 patients), who had no clinical metastasis and recurrence, and survived 5 years or more after surgery, all patients did not receive any postoperative treatment. Total RNA was extracted from the patients’ formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded esophageal cancer tissues. miR-382 level was evaluated using high-throughput real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction analysis. The correlation between miR-382 level and clinicopathologic features was analyzed through COX regression model, and Kaplan-Meier analysis was used to analyze the relationship between miR-382 level and patient survival time.

RESULTS: miR-382 was differentially expressed in the two groups. Overall the average miR-382 level in the ESCC patients with good outcome was 9.8 ± 3.8, while miR-382 level in the ESCC patients with poor outcome was 3.0 ± 0.8. The differences of miR-382 levels between two groups were significant (P < 0.05). Kaplan-Meier analysis results showed that miR-382 expression level generally had a significant reverse-correlation with ESCC patient survival time (P < 0.001), in which the patients with higher expressions of miR-382 had a longer survival time either among individuals with the same tumor stage or among the overall patients.

CONCLUSION: miR-382 levels are reverse-correlated with ESCC poor outcomes, suggesting that miR-382 could be a potential predictive biomarker for both prognosis and treatment of ESCC.

Keywords: Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma; miR-382; Metastasis; Outcome; Prognosis

Core tip: Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) patients often have significantly different outcomes due to early metastasis happening or not, although the patients are at the same pathological stage and receive the similar surgical therapy. Exploring novel biomarkers related with ESCC metastasis is required for monitoring the progression of the disease, and predicting the outcome of the patient after clinical intervention. Current research addressed a potential prognostic role of microRNA-382 in ESCC.