BACKGROUND: Long non-coding RNA SPRY4 intronic transcript 1 (lncRNA SPRY4-IT1) has been reported to be associated with the progression of several cancers, but its expression level in colorectal cancer (CRC) has rarely been reported. The purpose of this study was to estimate the clinical significance of SPRY4-IT1 in CRC.

MATERIAL AND METHODS: The relative expression levels of SPRY4-IT1 were detected by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) in diseased tissues and the adjacent normal tissues of 106 CRC patients. Chi-square method was used to evaluate the association between SPRY4-IT1 expression and the clinical features. Additionally, we assessed the overall survival at different expression levels of SPRY4-IT1 using Kaplan-Meier method. The prognostic significance of SPRY4-IT1 was estimated by Cox regression analysis.

RESULTS: Up-regulated level of SPRY4-IT1 was detected in pathologic tissues of CRC patients compared with adjacent normal tissues (P=0.000). The relative expression of SPRY4-IT1 was associated with the tumor size, the depth of invasion, lymph node invasion, distant invasion, and tumor stage (P<0.05). Patients with high expression of SPRY4-IT1 had poor overall survival compared with those with high level (39.3 vs. 49.3 months, log-rank test, P=0.016). Cox regression analysis showed that SPRY4-IT1 could act as an independent prognostic factor in CRC (HR=2.341, 95% CI=1.136–4.826, P=0.021).

CONCLUSIONS: SPRY4-IT1 might be associated with tumorigenesis and progression of CRC, and it may be a promising biomarker for prognosis in patients with CRC.

Keywords: Colorectal Neoplasms - genetics, Multivariate Analysis, Proportional Hazards Models, Up-Regulation - genetics