MicroRNA-21 expression is associated with overall survival in patients with glioma

Background: MicroRNA-21 has been proved to be associated with glioma proliferation and invasion; thus, we sought to clarify the clinical value of miR-21 expression in glioma tissues with WHO grade I to IV. Methods: One hundred and fifty-two pairs of human gliomas and non-neoplastic brain tissues were evaluated using real-time PCR. The association of miR-21 expression with clinicopathological factors or the prognosis of glioma patients was also analyzed. In this study, survival analysis was performed using the Kaplan-Meier method and Cox's proportional hazards model. Results: MiR-21 was more greatly expressed in glioma tissues compared to the corresponding non-neoplastic brain tissues (P < 0.001). This observed high miR-21 expression was significantly associated with high pathological grades and the Karnofsky performance score of glioma patients. In addition, overall patient survival for those with low miR-21 expression was significantly longer than those patients with high miR-21 expression (P < 0.001). Moreover, multivariate Cox regression analysis indicated that miR-21 might be an independent prognostic marker for glioma patient survival. Conclusions: Our data show that miR-21 may be a candidate independent marker for gliomas, especially those with high pathological grades, and this could also be a potential therapeutic target for molecular glioma therapy.