Diagnostic accuracy of MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry for non-small cell lung cancer: a meta-analysis

Objective: To assess the overall accuracy of matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) in identifying non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).Methods: A comprehensive search of PubMed, EMBASE and CNKI databases as well as the reference lists from relevant articles was performed prior to July 2017. Two authors independently screened articles based on inclusion and exclusion criteria and assessed the quality of each study using the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies 2 (QADAS-2) tool. Meta-disc 1.4 and Stata12.0 software programs were used for the statistical analysis.Results: Eleven eligible articles comprising 16 studies and representing 935 subjects were included in this meta-analysis. The pooled sensitivity and specificity were 0.84 (95% CI: 0.80-0.87) and 0.77 (95% CI: 0.74-0.80), respectively. The overall diagnostic performance as measured by the area under the curve (AUC) for the summary receiver-operating characteristic (SROC) curve was 0.9380.Conclusions: MALDI-TOF MS has a high diagnostic accuracy for NSCLC.