Abstract:

Background and purpose: Aberrant expressions of microRNAs (miRNA, miR)are reported in various cancers and may associate with cancer occurrence, development, invasion and metastasis, thereby functioning as either tumor suppressors or oncogenes. This study attempted to observe the expression of miR-214 in pancreatic cancer and to explore its clinical significance. Methods: Real-time PCR was used to detect the miR-214 expressions between pancreatic cancer tissues and matched adjacent tissues. The correlations of miR-214 expression with clinicpathological features and clinical prognosis were analyzed. Results: MiR-214 expression was up-regulated in 69.4% (25/36) of tumor tissue specimens. The relative expression level of miR-214 was significantly higher in tumor tissues than in matched adjacent tissues (3.45 vs 1.52, P<0.01). Higher miR-214 level was strongly associated with T3-T4 stage (P=0.018). The Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed that patients with higher expression of miR-214 had a shorter survival time (P=0.032). Conclusion: The expression of miR-214 is associated with clinic-pathological features and patient’s clinical prognosis, so it may be used as a potential diagnostic biomarker and a prognostic predictor in patients with pancreatic cancer.

Key words: Pancreatic neoplasms, MicroRNAs, Prognosis, MiR-214