Expression level of CDC2 gene in osteosarcoma and its clinical significance

The aim of the present study was to investigate the expression of cell division cycle gene 2 (CDC2) in osteosarcoma tissues and its clinical significance. Specimens of cancer tissues, paracancerous tissues and serum from 47 patients hospitalized at the Department of Orthopedics at The Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University (Guangzhou, China) from January, 2010 to January, 2015 and serum from 35 normal subjects were collected. The expression of CDC2 mRNA was evaluated using quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and the relationship between CDC2 protein expression and clinical features of patients with osteosarcoma was analyzed. There was a significant difference in the expression levels of CDC2 between cancer (2.31±0.306) and paracancerous tissues (0.91±0.251) (P<0.05), and there was a difference in the expression of CDC2 in serum between patients (1.58±0.149) and the normal control group (0.67±0.136). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis indicated that CDC2 was of great value in the diagnosis of osteosarcoma. The expression of CDC2 was closely related to the tumor diameter (P<0.05), World Health Organization classification (P<0.05) and KPS score (P<0.05). However, there was no significant association between the expression of CDC2 and factors including age and sex (both P>0.05). The high expression of CDC2 was closely related to the lower survival rate in patients with osteosarcoma (P<0.05). The increase of the tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) staging of osteosarcoma and the high expression of CDC2 are the risk factors affecting the prognosis of osteosarcoma patients (P<0.05), and Cox regression analysis showed that the expression level of CDC2 was a risk factor affecting the prognosis of osteosarcoma patients (P<0.05). The results indicate that CDC2 is highly expressed in osteosarcoma and may be a biomarker to predict the occurrence, development and prognosis of osteosarcoma.