Serum MicroRNA-125b as a Potential Biomarker for Glioma Diagnosis

Biomarkers in blood have become increasingly appreciated in the diagnosis of glioma, but most of their diagnostic accuracy was not high enough to be used widely in a clinical context. MicroRNA-125b (miRNA-125b, miR-125b), a member of microRNA cluster, is widely considered as ideal biomarkers for clinical diagnosis in various human cancers. In the current study, we first explored the diagnostic value of serum miR-125b for glioma in a Chinese population, which has not been studied yet. Additionally, we conducted a meta-analysis to assess the diagnostic accuracy of miR-125b in human cancers. Serum miR-125b from the 33 patients with glioma (WHO grades I-IV) and 33 healthy controls were compared. Our results showed that the serum miR-125b level was significantly lower in glioma patients when compared with normal population, and an obvious decreasing trend of miR-125b level along tumor stages was found. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis of the accuracy in distinguishing glioma cancer patients from healthy controls yielded an area under the curve (AUC) value of 0.839 (95 % confidence interval (CI), 0.743-0.935). When glioma patients at different stages were compared with normal controls, the AUC values of WHO grade II (0.868) and WHO grade III-IV (0.959) were higher than WHO grade I (0.691). In the meta-analysis, the overall sensitivity, specificity, and AUC for miR-125b in human cancers diagnosis were 82 % (95 % CI, 76-87 %), 77 % (95 % CI, 70-84 %), and 0.84 (95 % CI, 0.81-0.87), respectively. The results of the present study suggested that miR-125b could be a potential biomarker with relatively high accuracy in the diagnosis of glioma as well as other human cancers.