All submissions of the EM system will be redirected to Online Manuscript Submission System. Authors are requested to submit articles directly to Online Manuscript Submission System of respective journal.

Clinical significance of CTHRC1 protein expression in human cancers: a meta-analysis

Author(s): S.F. Wang, Z. Yin, J.J. Yin, W. Zhang and C.G. Dong

The aim of this meta-analysis was to investigate the overall diagnostic and prognostic values of CTHRC1 expression in human cancer development. Based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria, 8 cohort studies were included in the meta-analysis. The data were extracted, and analyses were performed using a random-effects model. Summary odds ratios (ORs) and effect sizes (ESs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated to assess the strength of the associations. A total of 1065 cancer patients from the 8 studies were included in the meta-analysis. The results revealed a positive correlation of CTHRC1 protein expression in tumors with tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage and with lymph node (LN) metastasis (TNM: OR = 2.98, 95%CI = 1.48-6.00, P = 0.002; LN: OR = 4.26, 95%CI = 1.88-9.67, P = 0.001). CTHRC1 expression was higher in tumors with sizes ≥5 cm than in tumors with sizes