Overexpression of is associated with poor prognosis and tumor progression of breast cancer in Chinese females.

BACKGROUND

Breast cancer represents a serious health issue among females. has been identified as an oncogene in human cancers. This study sought to assess the prognostic value and the biologic function of in breast cancer patients.

METHODS

Expression of in breast cancer tissues and cells was evaluated by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and Cox regression assay were conducted to explore the prognostic significance of . Cell experiments were performed to investigate the effects of on the biologic behaviors of breast cancer cells.

RESULTS

Expression of was significantly upregulated in both cancerous tissues and cells compared with the normal controls (all <0.05). Overexpression of was correlated with lymph node metastasis (=0.021) and TNM stage (=0.004). Patients with high had poor overall survival compared to those with low levels of (log-rank <0.05). Elevated was found to be an independent prognostic factor for the patients (hazard ratio=2.996, 95% CI=1.611-5.572, =0.001). According to the cell experiments, tumor cell proliferation, migration and invasion were suppressed by knockdown of .

CONCLUSION

All data demonstrated that overexpression of serves as a prognostic biomarker and may be involved in the tumor progression of breast cancer.