title: Prognostic significance of theBAALCgene expression in adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia: A meta-analysis.
abstract: Numerous studies have investigated the prognostic role of brain and acute leukemia, cytoplasmic (BAALC) gene expression in adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML); however, the results are inconclusive. A meta-analysis was conducted to provide a comprehensive evaluation of the prognostic role ofBAALCgene expression in AML. Eligible studies were searched through PubMed, Embase, the Cochrane Library, the China National Knowledge Infrastructure and the China Biology Medicine Disc. Correlations between theBAALCgene expression and clinicopathological features and prognosis were analyzed. A total of 15 studies were examined. The pooled results suggest that highBAALCexpression had an unfavorable outcome in AML. The combined hazard ratio (HR) for overall survival (OS) was 1.53 and the summary HR for the disease-free survival rate was 1.64. In addition, subgroup analyses considering cytogenetic and survival analysis were also conducted. HighBAALCgene expression appeared to be an adverse prognostic indicator in patients with cytogenetically normal AML (HR for OS, 1.43) and in subgroups of survival analysis with multivariate analysis (HR for OS, 2.35). These results indicate that highBAALC geneexpression served as an independent poor prognostic indicator in adult patients with AML.
authors.affiliation: Department of Hematology, Fujian Institute of Hematology, Fujian Provincial Key Laboratory on Hematology, Fujian Medical University Union Hospital, Fuzhou, Fujian 350001, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Shi-Ji
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.affiliation: Department of Hematology, Fujian Institute of Hematology, Fujian Provincial Key Laboratory on Hematology, Fujian Medical University Union Hospital, Fuzhou, Fujian 350001, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Jian-Zhen
authors.initials: JZ
authors.lastname: Shen
authors.affiliation: Department of Hematology, Fujian Institute of Hematology, Fujian Provincial Key Laboratory on Hematology, Fujian Medical University Union Hospital, Fuzhou, Fujian 350001, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Jin-Long
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Department of Hematology, Fujian Institute of Hematology, Fujian Provincial Key Laboratory on Hematology, Fujian Medical University Union Hospital, Fuzhou, Fujian 350001, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Hai-Ying
authors.initials: HY
authors.lastname: Fu
keywords: acute myeloid leukemia; brain and acute leukemia cytoplasmic gene; meta-analysis; prognosis