Overexpression of leucine-rich repeat-containing G protein-coupled receptor 5 predicts poor prognosis in hepatocellular carcinoma

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common malignancies and the fifth leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Novel prognostic biomarkers are urgently needed for patients with HCC. Leucine-rich repeat-containing G-protein coupled receptor 5 (LGR5) overexpression may promote tumor metastasis in HCC. However, few studies investigate the prognosis predictive role of LGR5 in patients with HCC. Herein, we aimed to examine the expression level of LGR5 in tumors and its correlation with clinical characteristics and survivals of patients with HCC. LGR5 expression in tumor specimens and adjacent tissue resected from 66 patients were detected by immunohistochemistry. The results showed that the expression of LGR5 was markedly higher in HCC than in normal adjacent tissues (P = .006). High expression of LGR5 was significantly correlated with later disease stage (P = .009). In addition, high LGR5 expression was remarkably correlated with short overall survival than those with low LGR5 expression (P < .05). The median overall survival of patients with high LGR5 expression was 12 months, whereas that of patients with low LGR5 expression was still not reached (longer than 70 months). Notably, in our limited cases, we did not detect any difference in tumor size, lymphatic invasion, or metastasis in patients with high or low expression of LGR5. In conclusion, high protein level of LGR5 was associated with poor prognosis of these patients. LGR5 appears to be a valuable prognostic predictor clinically and a potential target in HCC therapy.