Increased miR-25 expression in serum of gastric cancer patients is correlated with CA19-9 and acts as a potential diagnostic biomarker

Abstract Objective To evaluate miR-25 expression in serum of gastric cancer (GC) patients and whether it can be a potential biomarker for GC diagnosis. Methods Forty one pathology confirmed GC patients and 41 healthy controls were included in this study. 10 mL peripheral venous blood were collected from GC patients and healthy controls. miR-25 relative expression and CA19-9 level in serum of GC patients and healthy controls were measured by real-time reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) and enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), respectively. The diagnostic sensitivity, specificity and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of serum miR-25 and CA19-9 were calculated by STATA11.0 software. Results The relative expression of miR-25 was 0.47±0.53 and 0.05±0.36 in serum of GC patients and healthy controls respectively with significant statistical difference (P<0.05). The serum level of CA19-9 for GC patients and healthy controls were 11.91±6.17 U/mL and 7.40±3.97 U/mL, indicating GC patients were much higher than those of healthy controls (P<0.05). The diagnostic sensitivity and specificity were 78.05% and 60.98% with the cut-off value of 0.32 for serum miR-25. Under this cut-off value, the area under the ROC curve was 0.75. For serum CA19-9, the diagnostic sensitivity and specificity were 70.73% and 56.10% with the cut-off value of 9.22 U/mL. Under this cut-off value, the area under the ROC curve was 0.73 with the 95% confidence interval of 0.62-0.84. Positive correlation was found between serum miR-25 relative expression and CA19-9 concentration of GC patients (r=0.75, P<0.05). Conclusion According to our present study, serum miR-25 was elevated in GC patients which may serve as a diagnostic biomarker for GC.