Co-expression of MMP-14 and MMP-19 predicts poor survival in human glioma

Matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-14 and MMP-19 have been demonstrated to play an important role in the development of human gliomas. However, their prognostic values are not clear. The aim of this study was to investigate whether co-expression of MMP-14 and MMP-19 has prognostic relevance in human gliomas. Immunohistochemistry and western blot were used to investigate the expression of MMP-14 and MMP-19 proteins in 128 patients with gliomas. The expression levels of MMP-14 and MMP-19 proteins in glioma tissues were both significantly higher (both P < 0.001) than those in non-neoplastic brain tissues according to the immunohistochemistry analysis, which was confirmed by the western blot analysis. Additionally, the overexpression of either MMP-14 or MMP-19 was significantly associated with the advanced WHO grade (both P = 0.02), the low Karnofsky performance score (KPS) (P = 0.008 and 0.01, respectively) and the poor overall survival (both P = 0.01). Moreover, the Multivariate Cox proportional-hazards regression analysis revealed that the increased expressions of MMP-14 and MMP-19 were both independent prognostic factors for poor overall survival (both P = 0.02). Furthermore, the co-expression of MMP-14 and MMP-19 was additively and more significantly (P = 0.006) associated with adverse prognosis in patients with gliomas than respective expression of MMP-14 and MMP-19. These findings indicated for the first time that the co-expression of MMP-14 and MMP-19 is significantly correlated with prognosis in glioma patients, suggesting that the co-expression of these proteins may be used as both an early diagnostic and independent prognostic marker.