The Prognostic Value of Autophagy-Related Markers Bclin-1 and LC-3 in Colorectal Cancers: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Abstract EN

Objective.

At present, the relationship between autophagosomes and the prognosis of various cancers has become a subject of active investigation.

A series of studies have demonstrated the correlation between autophagy microtubule-associated protein light chain 3 (LC-3), Beclin-1, and colorectal cancer (CRC).

Since autophagy has dual regulatory roles in tumors, the results of this correlation are also uncertain.

Hence, we summarized the relationship between Beclin-1, LC-3, and CRC using systematic reviews and meta-analysis to clarify their prognostic significance in it.

Methods.

PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science databases were searched online up to April 1, 2019.

The quality of the involving studies was assessed against the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS).

Pooled hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) in a fixed or random effects model were used to assess the strength of correlation between Beclin-1, LC-3, and CRC.

Results.

A total of 9 articles were collected, involving 2,297 patients.

Most literatures scored more than 6 points, suggesting that the quality of our including research was acceptable.

Our finding suggested that the expression of Beclin-1 was not associated with overall survival (HR = 0.68, 95% CI (0.31–1.52), P=0.351).

Nonetheless, LC-3 expression exerted significant impact on OS (HR = 0.51, 95% CI (0.35–0.74), P<0.05).

Subgroup analysis exhibited that Beclin-1 expression was associated with OS at TNM stage III (HR = 0.04, 95% CI = 0.02–0.08, P<0.05), surgical treatment (HR = 1.53, 95% CI (1.15–2.02), P=0.003), and comprehensive treatment (HR = 0.27 95% CI (0.08–0.92), P=0.036), respectively.

Similarly, the results showed the increased LC-3 expression in CRC was related to OS in multivariate analyses (HR = 0.44, 95% CI (0.34–0.57), P<0.05), stages (HR = 0.51, 95% CI (0.35–0.74), P<0.05), and comprehensive treatment (HR = 0.44, 95% CI (0.34–0.57), P<0.05).

Conclusions.

Autophagy-related proteins of LC-3 might be an important marker of CRC progression.

However, since the number of the original studies was limited, more well-designed, large-scale, high-quality studies are warranted to provide more convincing and reliable information.