Clinical significance of microRNA-93 downregulation in human colon cancer.
OBJECTIVE
MicroRNA-93 (miR-93) has been shown to suppress proliferation and colony formation of colon cancer stem cells. The aim of this study was to examine the expression pattern and prognostic value of miR-93 in patients with colon cancer.


METHODS
A quantitative real-time PCR analysis was carried out to detect the expression levels of miR-93 in 138 paired samples of tumoral and nontumoral colon tissues diagnosed with colon cancer. Associations of miR-93 expression with clinicopathological parameters and survival were also examined.


RESULTS
miR-93 expression was significantly decreased in tumoral compared with nontumoral colon tissues (P<0.001). Low miR-93 expression was significantly correlated with advanced tumor stage (P=0.02), positive nodal metastasis (P=0.006), and positive distant metastases (P=0.01). In addition, Kaplan-Meier survival analysis by Cox regression showed that low miR-93 expression [hazard ratio (HR), 10.2; 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.9-42.8, P=0.003] was associated closely with poor overall survival in patients with colon cancer. Moreover, multivariate analysis showed that miR-93 decreased expression (HR, 4.3; 95% CI, 0.8-17.2, P=0.02), advanced tumor stage (HR, 3.1; 95% CI, 0.2-13.9, P=0.04), positive nodal metastasis (HR, 4.1; 95% CI, 0.7-16.8, P=0.02), and positive distant metastases (HR, 3.7; 95% CI, 0.5-14.1, P=0.03) were independent risk factors for overall survival in patients with colon cancer.


CONCLUSIONS
Our data show for the first time that the downregulation of miR-93 was significantly correlated with unfavorable clinicopathologic features and short overall survival in patients with colon cancer, suggesting that decreased expression of miR-93 be used as a novel prognostic factor for this disease.
National Hepatobiliary and Enteric Surgery Research Center, Ministry of Health, Central South University, Hunan, People's Republic of China.
Zhi-Gang
ZG
Xiao
Zhan-Sheng
ZS
Deng
Yang-De
YD
Zhang
Yang
Y
Zhang
Zhong-Cheng
ZC
Huang
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000032:analysis*; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D003110:Colonic Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008297:Male; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000032:analysis*; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D060787:Neoplasm Grading; D009361:Neoplasm Invasiveness; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D060888:Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D018570:Risk Assessment; D012307:Risk Factors; D013997:Time Factors; D015854:Up-Regulation
D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; C543350:MIRN93 microRNA, human; D035683:MicroRNAs