title: Prognostic significance of osteopontin in patients with non-small cell lung cancer: results from a meta-analysis.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is one of the most common malignancies with a high mortality level. Recently, a variety of studies explored the role of osteopontin (OPN) expression in the prognosis of NSCLC, but the results were controversial.
  
  
  METHODS
  We performed a meta-analysis of eligible studies to evaluate the prognostic significance of OPN expression in NSCLC patients. In order to assess the association between OPN and OS and DFS/PFS, hazard ratio (HR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) was calculated.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A total of ten studies comprising 1420 patients were included in the meta-analysis. The summary results indicated that high OPN expression was a poor predictor for OS (HR = 2.19, 95% CI: 1.6-2.98), and DFS/PFS (HR = 2, 95% CI: 1.66-2.41). Subgroup analysis revealed that high OPN expression was a negative prognostic marker for OS and DFS/PFS regardless of ethnicity background, treatment and OPN detection method.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results showed that increased OPN expression significantly correlated with poor OS and DPS/PFS in NSCLC patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cancer Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital and Chinese PLA Medical School Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Cancer Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital and Chinese PLA Medical School Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Xiaobin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Gu
authors.affiliation: Department of Respiratory Medicine, Hospital of Putian University Putian, Fujian, China.
authors.forename: Qunying
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.affiliation: Department of Cancer Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital and Chinese PLA Medical School Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Tian
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Tian
authors.affiliation: School of Medicine, Nankai University Tianjin, China.
authors.forename: Lijuan
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Shao
authors.affiliation: Department of Cancer Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital and Chinese PLA Medical School Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Chao
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Yuan
authors.affiliation: Department of Cancer Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital and Chinese PLA Medical School Beijing, China ; Department of International Joint Cancer Institute, The Second Military Medical University Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Bo
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Department of Cancer Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital and Chinese PLA Medical School Beijing, China ; Department of International Joint Cancer Institute, The Second Military Medical University Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Kexing
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Fan
keywords: Non-small cell lung cancer; biomarker; osteopontin; prognosis