Prognositic significance of P-cadherin expression in breast cancer: Protocol for a meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: P-cadherin is a calcium-dependent cell–cell adhesion glycoprotein. It has been implicated in invasiveness and metastasis. However, the clinical prognostic value of overexpression of P-cadherin in patients with breast cancer (BC) remains unsettled. METHODS: A systematic literature search will be performed in all available databases to quantitatively review eligible studies and identify all relevant data, which could be used to detect the relationship between overexpression of P-cadherin and overall survival (OS), disease-free survival (DFS), and clinicopathological parameters. Hazard ratio and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) or P value will be employed as effect measures to estimate the correlation between P-cadherin and the oncologic outcomes including overall survival (OS), disease-free survival (DFS). Odds ratios (ORs) and the 95% CIs will be evaluated for the pooled analysis of the correlation between P-cadherin expression and clinicopathological features. We will use the Review Manager (Revman) 5.3.5 software (Cochrane Community, London, United Kingdom) and STATA 14 software (version 14.0; Stata Corp, College Station, TX) to perform the meta-analysis to calculate the data. RESULTS: The review will provide a high-quality synthesis of current evidence of the prognostic role of P-cadherin in BCs. The results will be published in a peer-reviewed journal. CONCLUSION: We hope that the results of this study will provide significant evidence to assess whether the expression of P-cadherin is associated with poor prognosis in patients with BC. PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER: This meta-analysis protocol has been registered in the PROSPERO network with registration number: CRD42019119880.