title: Potential Role of Circulating microRNA-21 for Hepatocellular Carcinoma Diagnosis: A Meta-Analysis.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Circulating microRNA-21 (miR-21) is known to be aberrantly expressed in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients, and this implies that microRNA-21 is a promising and novel indicator of HCC. However, a systematic evaluation of the performance of microRNA-21 as a diagnostic marker for HCC has yet to be conducted. Therefore, the test performance of circulating miR-21 for HCC was assessed in this study.
  
  
  METHODS
  Three common international databases and a Chinese electronic database were used to search for literature on the diagnostic accuracy of microRNA-21 for HCC. The pooled results included the sensitivity and specificity of microRNA-21 for HCC detection and were analyzed with a random effect model. The area under summary receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) was used to estimate overall test performance.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A total of 339 HCC patients and 338 controls without HCC from four published studies were eligible for the meta-analysis and included in our study. The test performance of circulating miR-21 in HCC detection was assessed with the summary estimates of sensitivity and specificity, which were 81.2% (95% CI: 70.8% to 88.4%) and 84.8% (95% CI: 75.1% to 91.2%), respectively. The value of AUC was 0.90 (95% CI: 0.87 to 0.92). Significant inter-study heterogeneity was detected by our analysis, and sub-group analyses suggested that the type of control group was probably a source of heterogeneity.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our current findings suggested that circulating miR-21 can serve as a potential co-biomarker for early-stage HCC diagnosis. Thorough large-scale studies are needed to confirm the generalizability of our findings.
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Qibin
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Liao
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Peiyu
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Yue
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Zhitong
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Tropical Disease Research, School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Shanshan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Experimental Teaching Center of Preventive Medicine, School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Jufeng
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ye
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Tropical Disease Research, School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
authors.forename: Xianbo
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wu
mesh_terms: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000235:genetics; D006528:Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D008113:Liver Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000235:genetics; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D035683:MicroRNAs