Stem cell associated genes working with one miRNA cluster have different clinic pathologic values in gastric cancer.

Cancer stem cells are nowadays considered to be the origin of cancer. Also, stem cell associated genes are emerging as predictors of cancer malignancy. We investigated the association of several stemness genes (c-Myc, PTEN, p57 and p21) with clinic pathological parameters and survival in stomach cancer by performing immunohistochemistry on paraffin sections of gastric cancer patients who underwent surgical staging with following-up statistics. We discovered that expression of c-Myc was significantly related to distant metastasis, the combined expression of PTEN and p21 correlated positively to overall survival, while p57 was less useful in overall survival prediction in gastric cancer. Additionally, there is a positive correlation between expressions of p57 and p21. In conclusion, our present study indicated that expression of stemness genes (c-Myc, PTEN, p57 and p21) performed different predictive potential in the evaluation of clinical malignancy levels in gastric cancer.