Abstract
Studies have found that hypoxia is the most common feature in all of solid tumor progression, thus it has become a central issue in tumor physiology and cancer treatment. Hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) could make the tumor produce adaptive biological response to hypoxia and become more aggressive. In this paper, we used enzyme linked immune sorbent assay to detect the plasma level of HIF-1α in patients with NSCLC and healthy volunteers. The results indicated that the 5-year survival rate of patients with squamous cell carcinomas is negatively correlated with the plasma level of HIF-1α and the 5-year survival rate of patients with low level of HIF-1α is higher than those with high level of HIF-1α. The plasma level of HIF-1α in patients with NSCLC is significantly higher than healthy volunteers. There is no significant correlation between the plasma level of HIF-1α and clinical features of NSCLC patients. In a word, there is no connection between the plasma level of HIF-1α and the clinical features of NSCLC patients as well as their prognosis. In stratified analysis, the plasma level of HIF-1α in patients with squamous cell carcinoma is associated with regional lymph node status.