title: Prognostic role of high B7-H4 expression in patients with solid tumors: a meta-analysis.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Recently, many studies have shown that B7-H4 exhibits altered expression in various cancers. We performed a meta-analysis to evaluate the prognostic role of B7-H4 expression in solid tumors.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Data from 18 observational studies and 2467 patients were summarized. An elevated baseline B7-H4 was significantly associated with worse OS (pooled HR = 1.79; 95% CI = 1.56-2.06). Differences across subgroups of tumor type, patients' ethnicity, analysis type, HR obtain method and cut-off value were not significant (PD = 0.313, PD = 0.716, PD = 0.896, PD = 0.290 and PD = 0.153, respectively). Furthermore, patients with high B7-H4 had a significantly shorter DFS (pooled HR = 2.12; 95%CI = 1.45-3.09).
  
  
  METHODS
  We searched PubMed, Embase and the Cochrane Library (last update by November 26, 2015) to identify studies assessing the effect of B7-H4 on survival of cancer patients. Pooled hazard ratios (HRs) for overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) were estimated using fixed-effects models and random-effects models respectively.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This meta-analysis clarified that high B7-H4 expression in tissue was significantly associated with poor survival in patients with solid tumors. Future clinical studies are warranted to determine whether B7-H4 blockade has a favorable effect on disease recurrence and mortality.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xing
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Song
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yingjie
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Shao
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Wendong
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Gu
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Chao
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Huihui
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Mao
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Honglei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Pei
authors.affiliation: Department of Tumor Biological Treatment, The Third Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Changzhou 213003, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Jingting
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jiang
mesh_terms: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D006801:Humans; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000401:mortality* / Q000473:pathology; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D060907:V-Set Domain-Containing T-Cell Activation Inhibitor 1 / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D060907:V-Set Domain-Containing T-Cell Activation Inhibitor 1; C475826:VTCN1 protein, human
keywords: B7-H4; biomarker; meta-analysis; prognosis; solid tumor