Low expression of miR-1231 in patients with glioma and its prognostic significance.

OBJECTIVE: MiR-1231 has been reported to be down-regulated in glioma tissues and to act as a negative regulator in glioma progression. However, the clinical significance of miR-1231 remains unclear. In this study, we aimed to further demonstrate the expression pattern and prognostic value of miR-1231 in glioma patients. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We determined the expression level of miR-1231 in 154 cases of paired glioma and adjacent non-tumor tissues by quantitative Real Time-PCR (qRT-PCR). The association between miR-1231 expression levels and clinicopathological factors was examined by the χ2 test. The Kaplan-Meier survival analysis was performed to analyze the association of miR-1231 expression with overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) of patients. The significance of survival variables was analyzed using the Cox multivariate proportional hazards model. RESULTS: We found that the expression level of miR-1231 in human glioma tissues was significantly lower than that in the adjacent nontumorous tissues (p<0.01). The expression levels of miR-1231 in glioma tissues with high grades were significantly lower than those with low grades. Decreased miR-1231 expression was significantly associated with advanced WHO grade (p=0.001) and KPS score (p=0.023). The Kaplan-Meier analysis indicated that low miR-1231 expression had a significant impact on OS (p=0.0103) and PFS (p=0.0019). Cox proportional hazards risk analysis demonstrated that miR-1231 was an independent prognostic factor for glioma. CONCLUSIONS: Our study, for the first time, provides evidence that evaluating miR-1231 in glioma may have prognostic and predictive value in the clinical management of glioma.