Molecular Medicine Ph.D. School, Department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, 43125 Parma, Italy.
Dentistry and Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery-Department of Surgical, Medical, Dental and Morphological Science with interest in Transplant Oncological and Regenerative Medicine-University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Largo del Pozzo 71, 41125 Modena, Italy.
Int J Mol Sci. 2020 Jan 30;21(3):907. doi: 10.3390/ijms21030907.
Background: The aberrant expression of microRNAs (miRNAs) has been associated with several diseases, including cancer, inflammatory, and autoimmune conditions. Interest in salivary miRNAs as non-invasive tools for the diagnosis of malignancies and systemic diseases is rapidly increasing. The present systematic review was developed for answering the question: "Are salivary microRNAs reliable biomarkers for diagnosis of cancer and systemic diseases?"
The application of inclusion and exclusion criteria led to the selection of 11 papers. Critical appraisals and quality assessments of the selected studies were performed through the National Institute of Health "Study Quality Assessment Tool" and the classification of the Oxford Center for Evidence-Based Medicine.
Seven studies reported statistically significant correlations between one or more salivary miRNAs and the investigated disease. The critical analysis allowed us to classify only two studies (18.2%) as having "good" quality, the rest being scored as "intermediate" (8; 73%) and "poor" (1; 9%). Evidence exists that salivary miR-940 and miR-3679-5p are reliable markers for pancreatic cancer and that miR140-5p and miR301a are promising molecules for the salivary diagnosis of gastric cancer.
Further studies, possibly avoiding the risk of bias highlighted here, are necessary to consolidate these findings and to identify new reliable salivary biomarkers.
微小 RNA（miRNA）的异常表达与多种疾病有关，包括癌症、炎症和自身免疫性疾病。人们对唾液 miRNA 作为恶性肿瘤和系统性疾病非侵入性诊断工具的兴趣正在迅速增加。本系统评价旨在回答以下问题：“唾液 miRNA 作为癌症和系统性疾病诊断的可靠生物标志物是否可靠？”
应用纳入和排除标准，选择了 11 篇论文。通过美国国立卫生研究院“研究质量评估工具”和牛津循证医学中心对选定研究进行了批判性评估和质量评估。
有 7 项研究报道了一种或多种唾液 miRNA 与所研究疾病之间存在统计学显著相关性。批判性分析允许我们仅将两项研究（18.2%）归类为“良好”质量，其余研究的评分为“中等”（8 项；73%）和“差”（1 项；9%）。有证据表明，唾液 miR-940 和 miR-3679-5p 是胰腺癌的可靠标志物，miR140-5p 和 miR301a 是唾液诊断胃癌有前途的分子。
需要进一步的研究，可能需要避免这里强调的偏倚风险，以巩固这些发现，并确定新的可靠唾液生物标志物。
