circ_0067934: A Potential Biomarker and Therapeutic Target for Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a high-level invasive and metastatic malignancy with a low survival rate. Accumulating evidence has proved that circular RNAs (cirRNAs) function as potential biomarkers for diagnosis or prognosis in various cancer, including HCC. In the present study, we aimed to explore a novel biomarker, circ_0067934 for diagnosis and prognosis of HCC so as to contribute to therapeutic strategies. In the present study, the expression levels of circ_0067934 in HCC patients and paired controls were determined by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) analysis. The correlation between different circ_0067934 expressions with clinicopathological factors of HCC patients was analyzed by one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). Then, we examined the potential diagnostic value of circ_0067934 by measuring the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves. Finally, the overall survival rate evaluated by Spearman's rank correlation coefficient of HCC patients with different circ_0067934 was compared in order to present the prognostic value of circ_0067934 in HCC. From the results, qRT-PCR analysis revealed that circ_0067934 was significantly up-regulated in HCC tissues compared with adjacent non-tumor tissues. Moreover, circ_0067934 positively correlated with tumor size (P=0.0025), TNM stage (P<0.0001) and microvascular invasion (P<0.0001). However, there were no significant differences in gender, age, family history, diabetes, ALT, AST, AFP and AKP. Meanwhile, the ROC curves presented that circ_0067934 had favorable specificity and sensitivity with the area under the curves of 0.8412 (95% CI=0.7881 to 0.8943). Furthermore, the upregulation of circ_0067934 was associated with unfavorable prognosis in patients with HCC. In conclusion, circ_0067934 may function as a potential biomarker for the diagnosis and prognosis of HCC.