Reduced miR-490-3p expression is associated with poor prognosis of Helicobacter pylori induced gastric cancer.

OBJECTIVE: Helicobacter pylori (HP) infection has been demonstrated to be a risk factor accounting for the initiation and development of gastric cancer (GC). The aim of the present study was to investigate the clinical significance of miR-490-3p in HP associated GC.

PATIENTS AND METHODS: We measured the expression level of miR-490-3p in human GC tissues by quantitative Real-time PCR (qPCR). Then the association between miR-490-3p and clinical features of GC was further investigated.

RESULTS: Our results showed that miR-490-3p levels exhibited a progressive downregulation in gastritis, intestinal metaplasia, HP negative GC and HP positive GC. In addition, miR-490-3p expression was significantly correlated with various clinicopathological parameters such as lymph node metastasis and clinical stage in HP-positive GC. Moreover, GC patients with lower miR-490-3p had a shorter 5 years overall/disease free survival time in the HP positive cohort. Finally, multivariate analysis showed that low miR-490-3p was an independent risk factor for HP associated GC.

CONCLUSIONS: miR-490-3p is downregulated in HP-positive GC and associated with poor clinical outcome, indicating that miR-490-3p is a promising prognostic biomarker for HP positive GC.