Meta-analysis reveals the correlation of Notch signaling with non-small cell lung cancer progression and prognosis.

Xun Yuan,Hanxiao Xu,Shiying Yu,Qian Chu,Hua Wu,Yuan Chen,Na Han,Kongming Wu

doi:10.1038/srep10338

Abstract

Various studies have assessed the clinicopathological and prognostic value of Notch1 and Notch3 expression in Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), but their results remain controversial. This meta-analysis was conducted to address the above issues by using a total of 19 studies involving 3663 patients. The correlations between Notch1 and Notch3 expression and clinicopathological features and NSCLC prognosis were analyzed. The meta-analysis indicated that higher expression of Notch1 was associated with greater possibility of lymph node metastasis and higher TNM stages. Moreover, patients with Notch1 overexpression and Notch3 overexpression showed significantly poor overall survival (Notch1: HR, 1.29; 95% CI, 1.06–1.57, p = 0.468 and I2 = 0.0%; Notch3: HR, 1.57; 95%CI, 1.04-2.36, p = 0.445 and I2 = 0.0%). Furthermore, there are statistically significant association between overall survival of NSCLC patients and the expression of Notch signaling ligand DLL3 and target gene HES1. Our meta-analysis supports that Notch signaling is a valuable bio-marker to predict progression and targeting Notch signaling could benefit subpopulation of NSCLC patients.

Highlights

The study flow diagram for the identification of eligible studies is shown in Fig. 1. 111 articles were found by our search strategy
These studies mainly evaluated the correlation between the expression of Notch[1] and Notch[3] with clinical parameters for Non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), based on either clinicopathological features or prognostic factors
It is generally assumed that Notch[1] and Notch[3] activity were higher in advanced NSCLC and predicted poor prognosis[16,19]; opposite result was reported in lung squamous carcinoma[10]

Summary

Introduction

We found that Notch[1] was correlated with the overall survival rate of NSCLC patients (pooled HR = 1 .29, 95%CI: 1.06-1.57, p = 0 .468 and I2 = 0.0%) (Fig. 3A). Our meta-analysis demonstrated that Notch[3] expressions in NSCLC tissues were significantly correlated with the overall survival rate of NSCLC patients (pooled HR, 1.57; 95%CI, 1.04-2.36, p = 0.445 and I2 = 0.0%) (Fig. 4A).

Results

Conclusion