Hypoxia inducible factor: a potential prognostic biomarker in oral squamous cell carcinoma

Abstract

Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is the most common oral cancer. Hypoxia inducible factor (HIF) is involved in many malignant tumors’ growth and metastasis and upregulated by hypoxia, including oral cancer. Many studies have studied about the prognostic value of HIF expression in OSCC; however, they do not get the consistent results. Therefore, this study explored the correlation between the HIF expression and the prognosis of OSCC. It conducted a meta-analysis of relevant publications searched in the Web of Science, PubMed, and ISI Web of Knowledge databases. Totally, this study identified 12 relevant articles reporting a total of 1112 patients. This analysis revealed a significant association between increased risk of mortality (RR = 1.20; 95 % CI 0.74–1.95; I2 85.4 %) and overexpression of HIFs. Furthermore, different HIF isoforms were associated with overall survival [HIF-1α (RR = 1.18; 95 % CI 0.66–2.11; I2 87.2 %) and HIF-2α (RR = 1.40; 95 % CI 0.93–2.09; I2 0.0 %)]. These results show that overexpression of HIFs, regardless of whether the HIF-1α or HIF-2α isoforms are overexpressed is significantly associated with increased risk of mortality in OSCC patients. In this study, the funnel is symmetric, suggesting existed no publication bias.