Prognostic and clinicopathological significance of long non-coding RNA UCA1 in colorectal cancer: Results from a meta-analysis

OBJECTIVE: Urothelial cancer-associated 1 (UCA1), an oncogenic long non-coding RNA, was aberrantly upregulated in colorectal cancer (CRC). This study aimed to further explore the clinical value of UCA1 in CRC. METHODS: Eligible studies were retrieved by searching Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, and Wanfang databases. Pooled hazard ratio (HR) and odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) were applied to assess the prognostic role and clinical significance of UCA1. RESULTS: A total of 7 eligible studies with 775 cancer patients were recruited in the meta-analysis. The results showed that UCA1 overexpression was significantly correlated with poor overall survival in patients with CRC (HR = 2.25, 95% CI: 1.77–2.87, P < .001). There was also a significantly negative association between high UCA1 levels and tumor differentiation (OR = 2.84, 95% CI: 1.87–4.31, P < .001), lymph node metastasis (OR = 3.48, 95% CI: 2.24–5.41, P < .001), distant metastasis (OR = 2.67, 95% CI: 1.32–5.38, P = .006), tumor node metastasis stage (OR = 3.01, 95% CI: 2.16–4.18, P < .001), tumor invasion depth (OR = 2.18, 95% CI: 1.03–4.61, P = .04), and tumor size (OR = 2.27, 95% CI: 1.56–3.32, P < .001). CONCLUSIONS: Our study revealed that UCA1 overexpression was associated with poor prognosis and more advanced clinicopathological features, suggesting that UCA1 may serve as an indicator for unfavorable outcome of patients with CRC.