BACKGROUND

Small nucleolar RNA host genes (SNHG), a novel long non-coding RNA is involved in cancer cell proliferation, migration, and invasion. Moreover, there are some reports that SNHG is associated with prognosis in cancer patients and may contribute to diagnosis or prognostic prediction of cancer. This study analyzes the association between SNHGs expression and prognosis and clinicopathological factors in breast cancer.

METHODS

Eligible studies were searched through the PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane library until February 14, 2024. Pooled hazard ratio (HR) and odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated to elucidate the prognostic and clinicopathological significance of SNHG expression in breast cancer.

RESULTS

Nine studies with a total of 2268 breast cancer patients analyzed. The pooled results proved that high expression of SNHG was associated with unfavorable overall survival (OS) in patients with breast cancer (HR 1.39, 95% CI 1.22-1.59, P < .001). High expression of SNHG was significantly correlated with advanced clinicopathological factors, including larger tumor size (OR 2.31, 95% CI 1.42-3.76, P = .001), lymph node metastasis (OR 4.02, 95% CI 2.46-6.56, P < .001) and tumor-node-metastasis stage (OR 3.47, 95% CI 1.70-7.07, P = .001).

CONCLUSION

High expression of SNHG was associated with unfavorable OS and advanced clinicopathological factors, suggesting that SHNG may be serve as a novel prognostic biomarker in patients with breast cancer.