The association of miR-451 and miR-21 in plasma with lymph node metastases in breast cancer

In recent years, it has been proved that microRNAs are involved in regulating gene expression, tumorigenic and metastasis and, the use of circulating miRNAs, due to its high stability, correlation with diseases states and easy to measure with high sensitivity have attracted as a new class of cancer biomarkers. Previous studies have shown that miR-451 and miR-21 are potential biomarkers with high sensitivity, specificity and are enable to detect types of cancers. The role of these two miRNAs in tumorigenic and metastasis of cancers has also been identified. The present study examines the expression pattern of miR-451 and miR-21 in relation to the clinicopathologic status.
Material and Plasma samples were collected from 47 women with breast cancer and 24 healthy women. Clinicopathologic information was provided from the hospital records. The changes in expression of miR-451 and miR-21 in patients were evaluated using the qRT-PCR method. Data analysis was done using SPSS software.
The changes in expression of miR-451 and miR-21 in the plasma of breast cancer patients were correlated with the status of lymph node metastases, decreased 0.38 times and increased 1.73 times respectively (P = 0.046 and P =0.037, respectively).
The expression of miR-451 and miR-21 in plasma of patients with breast cancer was associated with lymph node metastases. It may be possible to use these microRNAs as prognostic biomarkers, increasing the recognition of the molecular pathways involved and to distinguish the clinicopathology of this cancer in order to define new targeted therapies.