miR-149 rs2292832 C>T polymorphism and risk of gastric cancer.

Accumulating evidence that microRNA (miRNA) genes are involved in different processes associated with gastric carcinogenesis. The polymorphisms located on miRNA sequences may affect the interaction with their target messenger RNAs (mRNAs) and, consequently, genetic susceptibility to disease. The aim of our study was to investigate the association of miR-149 rs2292832 C>T polymorphism and gastric cancer susceptibility in Romanian patients. A total of 142 patients with gastric adenocarcinoma and 288 healthy controls were included in this study. The miR-149 rs2292832 allelic variants were genotyped by real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) using specific TaqMan predesigned probes. The association between polymorphism and gastric cancer risk was estimated by odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI). The miR-149 rs2292832 C>T was not associated with susceptibility to gastric cancer, when TT genotype was compared with the more frequent AA genotype (OR 0.98, 95% CI 0.55-1.77, p=0.96) or when we used dominant and recessive models. Also, we compared allele frequencies and no correlation was found (OR 0.92, 95% CI 0.68-1.24, p=0.57). The sub-classification of gastric cancer into non-cardia and cardia or intestinal and diffuse type did not reveal any statistically significant difference for investigated polymorphism.