Diagnostic Value of MicroRNA 21 in Endometrial Cancer and Benign Lesions and its Differential Expression with Clinicopathological Parameters

Abstract

Background: Endometrial cancer is one of the most common malignancies among women worldwide. Although this cancer is often diagnosed at early stages, the need for biomarkers of diagnosis remains a necessity to overcome conventional invasive procedures of diagnosis. Objective: In our study, we aim to investigate the diagnostic value of microRNA-21 in endometrial cancer and its relation to clinicopathological features. Methods: We used RT-qPCR to measure the expression of microRNA-21 in 71 tumor tissues, 53 adjacent tissues, and 54 benign lesions. Results: Our results show that microRNA-21 is a potential biomarker for endometrial cancer with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.925 (95% CI = 0.863 - 0.964, P<0.0001). The sensitivity was 84.51% (95% CI = 74.0 - 92.0) and specificity was 86.79% (95% CI = 74.7 - 94.5). For discrimination between benign lesions and controls the AUC was 0,881 with a sensitivity of 100% (95% CI = 93.4 - 100.0) and specificity of 66.04 % (95% CI = 51.7 - 78.5), and for discriminating benign lesions from tumors the AUC was 0,750 with a sensitivity of 54.93% (95% CI = 42.7 - 66.8) and specificity of 90.74% (95% CI = 79.7 - 96.9). We also found that tumors with elevated microRNA-21 expression are of advanced FIGO stage, high histological grades, and have cervical invasion, myometrial invasion and distant metastasis. Conclusion: Our findings support the important role of miR-21 as a biomarker for the diagnosis of endometrial cancer. Further studies on minimally invasive/noninvasive samples such as serum, blood, and urine are necessary to provide a better alternative to current diagnosis methods.

Absolute Quantification of Selected microRNAs Expression in Endometrial Cancer by Digital PCR

“…Bouziyane et al demonstrated the high diagnostic efficacy of miR-21-5p in their research. This study included a large group of 71 endometrial cancer tissues, 53 adjacent tissues, and 54 benign lesions [ 49 ].…”

Integrated multi-omics analyses and functional validation reveal TTK as a novel EMT activator for endometrial cancer

“…Prior studies have shown that ECs with high levels of miR-21 expression had advanced tumor stages, high histological grades, cervical invasion, myometrial invasion, and distant metastasis [ 52 ]. As a result, miR-21 might be used as a biomarker to identify benign lesions from ECs [ 52 ]. MiR-21 has been shown to promote the growth of esophageal carcinoma [ 53 ], melanoma [ 54 ], and cervical cancer [ 55 ].…”

Diagnostic Accuracy of Liquid Biomarkers for the Non-Invasive Diagnosis of Endometrial Cancer: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…With regard to the review of exosomal biomarkers, 15 studies were eligible for inclusion, and these reported on 29 different exosomal biomarkers and a total of 5527 patients. Amongst this group 2530 had a diagnosis of EC and 2456 were non-cancerous control-group patients [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43]. Only Mi-RNA 21, 27a, and 223 were suitable for meta-analysis as they met the inclusion criteria and were reported by two or more studies.…”

“…The control groups consisted of healthy women with normal endometrium as well as those with benign endometrial lesions such as polyps and fibroids. Only studies of micro-RNA 21, 27a, and 223 were suitable for meta-analysis after meeting the inclusion criteria [29][30][31][32][33][34][35]. None of the included studies reported positive predictive values (PPV) or negative predictive values (NPV) (Table 1).…”