Long Noncoding RNA Serve as a Potential Predictive Biomarker for Breast Cancer: A Meta-Analysis

The detection of long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) is a novel method for breast cancer diagnosis. The purpose of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the clinical significance of lncRNAs in identification of human breast cancer.

Electronic databases, including PubMed (176), EMBASE (167), Cochrane Library (4), Web of Science (273), CNKI (41), VIP (18), and wanfang (21), were searched for relevant original articles. Diagnostic capacity of lncRNAs was assessed by pooled sensitivity and specificity, area under the summary receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC), diagnostic odds ratio (DOR), and subgroup and meta-regression analysis. Stata and Meta-Disc software were used to conduct the meta-analysis.

33 articles including 4500 cases were identified in our meta-analysis. lncRNAs sustained a high diagnostic efficacy; the pooled sensitivity, specificity, AUC, and DOR of lncRNAs in differentiating BC from controls were 0.74 (95% CI: 0.69-0.78), 0.78 (95% CI: 0.72-0.83), 0.82 (95% CI: 0.79-0.85), and 10.01 (95% CI: 7.13-14.06), respectively. The subgroup analysis showed that the diagnostic efficacy of lncRNAs in Asian populations was higher than that in Caucasians; lncRNAs in BC were lower than those in TNBC and were higher in plasma and serum specimens than in tissues. In addition, heterogeneity was clearly apparent but was not caused by the threshold effect.

This meta-analysis suggested that lncRNAs might be promising biomarkers for identifying breast cancer, and its clinical application warrants further investigation.