Abstract
A number of studies have revealed that nuclear paraspeckle assembly transcript 1 (NEAT1), a long noncoding RNA (lncRNA), was aberrantly regulated in various cancers. High NEAT1 expression was associated with a poor prognosis and an increased risk of lymph node metastasis (LNM) in cancer patients. This meta-analysis was conducted to identify the potential value of NEAT1 as a biomarker for cancer prognosis. We searched the electronic databases PubMed, Web of Science, and China National Knowledge Infrastructure (up to November 13, 2016) to collect all relevant studies to explore the association between the expression of lncRNA NEAT1 and overall survival (OS) and LNM. The results showed that cancer patients with high NEAT1 expression had a poorer OS than those with low NEAT1 expression (hazard ratio: 1.88, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.41-2.50, P=0.000). Subgroup analyses by cancer type and sample size indicated that digestive system cancer patients with high NEAT1 expression experienced an increased risk of developing LNM (odds ratio: 1.96, 95% CI: 1.25-3.06, P=0.003). In conclusion, the present meta-analysis showed that high expression of NEAT1 might potentially serve as a reliable biomarker for poor clinical outcome in various cancers. However, owing to the limited size of samples, further clinical studies are required to verify our findings.