Table 1.
Characteristics of the studies included in the meta-analysis.
| Author | Year | Country | Type | Sample | Number | Method | Cutoff | Survival | HR | Max follow-up (months) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chen | 2014 | China | Pancreatic | Plasma | 109 | qRT-PCR | Youden index | OS, DFS | R | 60 |
| Rapti | 2014 | Greece | Colorectal | Frozen tissue | 105 OS | qRT-PCR | 65% | OS, DFS | R | 120 |
| 92 DFS | ||||||||||
| Wang | 2014 | China | Colorectal | FFPE | 138 | ISH | Score = 3 (0–7) | OS | R | 96 |
| Li | 2014 | China | Pancreatic | Primary tissue | 38 | qRT-PCR | Matched nontumor tissue | OS | SC | 36 |
| Pignot | 2013 | France | MIBC | Frozen tissue | 72 | qRT-PCR | NR | OS, RFS | SC | 65 |
| Kunder | 2013 | India | Group 3 and 4 medulloblastomas | Frozen tissue + FFPE | 37 | qRT-PCR | Log2 (relative quantity) | OS | R | 60 |
| Liu | 2013 | China | Colorectal | Frozen tissue | 148 | qRT-PCR | Median | OS | R | 89 |
| McMillen | 2012 | USA | Grade III or IV ovarian | FFPE | 107 | ISH | Score > 1.5 (0–3) | OS | R | 82 |
| Zhu | 2011 | China | NSCLC | Frozen tissue | 70 | qRT-PCR | Median | OS | R | 25 |
| Jiang | 2010 | China | Glioma | PE | 119 | qRT-PCR | Median | OS | (RR) R | 80 |
| Stenvold | 2014 | Norway | NSCLC | FFPE | 305 | ISH | Score > 0 (0–3) | DSS | R | 234 |
| Lei | 2014 | China | Breast | Fresh tumor specimens | 38 | qRT-PCR | Median | RFS | SC | 50 |
| Wang | 2012 | China | HCC | Frozen tissue | 86 | qRT-PCR | Median | DFS | SC | 56 |
| Schaefer | 2010 | Germany | Prostate | Frozen tissue | 75 | qRT-PCR | Median | RFI | R | 93 |
| Casanova-Salasa | 2014 | Spain | Prostate | FFPE | 272 | qRT-PCR | Low/medium/high | PFS | SC | 189 |
| Rodríguez-Gonzáleza | 2011 | Netherlands | ER+ breast | Tissue | 246 | qRT-PCR | Divided into quarters | PFS | SC | 24 |
| Hiratab | 2012 | USA | Bladder | FFPE | 18 | qRT-PCR | Median | OS | SC | 120 |
| Hiratab | 2013 | USA | Prostate | FFPE | 52 | qRT-PCR | Median | OS | SC | 100 |
DFS: disease-free survival, DSS: disease-specific survival, ER: estrogen receptor, FFPE: formalin-fixed paraffin embedded tissues, HCC: hepatocellular carcinoma, HR: hazard ratio, ISH: in situ hybridization, MIBC: muscle-invasive bladder cancer, NR: not reported, NSCLC: nonsmall lung cancer, OS: overall survival, PFS: progression-free survival, R: reported, RFI: recurrence-free interval, RFS: relapse-free survival, RR: relative risk, and SC: survival curve.
aExcluded due to nondichotomy; b95% CIs of HR extracted from the Kaplan-Meier survival curves were not accurate (HR > 50, 95% CI: 0–∞).