Bao Quanwa, Li Feng, Zheng Houzhen, Chen Shaobo, Song Xiao
State Key Laboratory of Genetic Engineering, School of Life Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China.
Department of Orthopaedics, The 943rd Hospital of Joint Logistics Support Force of PLA, Wuwei 733000, China.
J Thorac Dis. 2020 Mar;12(3):823-829. doi: 10.21037/jtd.2019.12.71.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer incidence and mortality. Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for the vast majority of lung cancer, which lacks comprehensive prognostic biomarkers to predict the prognosis of patients. This research was performed to assess the potential prognostic role of circular RNAs (circRNAs) in patients with NSCLC.
We searched the following databases: PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, and Ovid MEDLINE(R) up to May 20, 2019 to identify studies which explored the association between circRNAs and NSCLC. Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS) was applied to assess the quality of the included studies. Pooled hazard ratios (HRs) and the corresponding 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated to assess the prognostic value of circRNAs in patients with NSCLC. Subgroup analyses were performed to explain heterogeneity among the included studies. Publication bias was estimated using Begg's funnel plot. Sensitivity analysis was performed to test the stability of pooled results.
A total of 19 eligible studies including 1,650 NSCLC patients were included in this research. Pooled results indicated that the up-regulated expression of circRNAs was significantly associated with worse prognosis of patients with NSCLC (HR =2.08, 95% CI: 1.81-2.40).
Our finding indicated that circRNAs could serve as prognostic biomarkers in patients with NSCLC. However, further large-scale prospective studies about the clinical significance of circRNAs are of great need in order to obtain conclusive results.
肺癌是癌症发病率和死亡率的主要原因。非小细胞肺癌（NSCLC）占肺癌的绝大多数，目前缺乏全面的预后生物标志物来预测患者的预后。本研究旨在评估环状RNA（circRNAs）在NSCLC患者中的潜在预后作用。
我们检索了以下数据库：截至2019年5月20日的PubMed、Web of Science、Embase和Ovid MEDLINE(R)，以识别探索circRNAs与NSCLC之间关联的研究。应用纽卡斯尔-渥太华量表（NOS）评估纳入研究的质量。计算合并风险比（HRs）和相应的95%置信区间（CI），以评估circRNAs在NSCLC患者中的预后价值。进行亚组分析以解释纳入研究之间的异质性。使用Begg漏斗图评估发表偏倚。进行敏感性分析以检验合并结果的稳定性。
本研究共纳入19项符合条件的研究，包括1650例NSCLC患者。合并结果表明，circRNAs表达上调与NSCLC患者预后较差显著相关（HR =2.08，95% CI：1.81-2.40）。
我们的研究结果表明，circRNAs可作为NSCLC患者的预后生物标志物。然而，为了获得确凿的结果，迫切需要进一步开展关于circRNAs临床意义的大规模前瞻性研究。
