To investigate the expressions of microRNA(miR)- 200a in serum and carcinoma tissues and its relationship with prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Ninety-five cases of HCC undergoing surgical treatment in the Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery at Zhengzhou People's Hospital and the Affiliated Tumor Hospital of Zhengzhou University were enrolled.The expression levels of miR-200a in serum and tumor tissues of patients with HCC were detected by using real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction(Realtime PCR). The relationships between the expression of miR-200a and clinicopathological features and prognosis of patients were analyzed.

The relative expression of miR-200a in patients with HCC was 4.57±1.36, statistically significantly lower than 5.98±0.62 in the control group (P< 0.05). The relative expression levels of miR- 200a in normal liver tissue, adjacent tissue and liver cancer tissue were 2.67±0.31,1.73±0.15 and 0.68±0.11 with the differences being statistically significant(P< 0.05).The pairwise comparison showed that miR- 200a expression levels were in HCC tissues< adjacent tissues< normal liver tissue(P< 0.05).The expression of miR- 200a in serum of HCC patients serum was correlated with alpha fetal protein(AFP)levels, degree of differentiation, metastasis and TNM staging(P< 0.05). The expression of miR- 200a in HCC tissues was correlated with degree of differentiation and metastasis(P< 0.05).The 5- year cumulative survival rate in high miR- 200a expression group was 63.7%, and that in the low miR- 200a expression group was 41.9%.The survival of HCC patients in high miR- 200a expression group was significantly improved as ocmpared with that in low miR- 200a expression group(χ²= 4.711,P< 0.05).

miR- 200a showed low expression in serum and liver cancer tissue of patients with HCC.It is an important tumor suppressor gene, closely related to the degree of malignancy and can affect the prognosis of HCC patients.

Carcinoma, hepatocellular; MicroRNA- 200a; Serum; Prognosis