Combined low miR-34s are associated with unfavorable prognosis in children with hepatoblastoma: A Chinese population-based study

Purpose: The aim of this study is to identify the association between miR-34's family and the prognosis of HB in a large Asian cohort and to explore the interaction of miR-34 with other independent risk factors in the process of affecting prognosis of HB. Methods: We retrospectively reviewed 78 children with HB (36 female, 42 male) managed in our institutions between 2007 and 2014. The expression of miR-34 was detected by real-time PCR. Prognostic factors were evaluated using Kaplan-Meier curves and Cox proportional hazards models. Results: For the entire cohort of 76 patients, The normalized real-time PCR results showed that all three miRNAs were deregulated in tumor tissues as compared with corresponding noncancerous tissue samples. Descriptive survival statistics and Kaplan-Meier curves suggested that AFP levels, metastases, vascular invasion, PRETEXT stage and miR-34 had prognostic significance in this relatively selected cohort. After that we made miR-34 into different combinations. The results demonstrated that combined low miR-34a and miR-34b (HR: 2.212, P = 0.016), combined low miR-34a and miR-34c (HR: 1.984, P = 0.025) and combined low miR-34a, miR-34b and miR-34c (HR: 3.569, P = 0.001) were independent prognostic factors of HB. We further conduct stratified analysis of the impact of other identified risk factors on the combined low of three miR-34. Conclusions: In this study, we found that miR-34s were deregulated in tumor tissues compared with corresponding noncancerous tissue samples. We also confirmed that combined low miR-34 is an independent prognostic factor related with HB. (C) 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.