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. 2022 Aug 18;17(8):e0273317. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0273317

Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Xiaoyu Yang 1, Yunhong Xia 1,*, Shuomin Wang 1, Chen Sun 1
Editor: Raj Kumar Koiri2
PMCID: PMC9387809  PMID: 35981080

Abstract

Objective

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is characterized by a high degree of malignancy, rapid proliferation of tumor cells, and early liver metastasis. Resistance to multiple drugs independent of the high expression of secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine (SPARC) is associated with a high risk of recurrence and mortality. However, the prognostic value of SPARC in patients with HCC remains unclear. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis to evaluate the relationship between the expression of SPARC and the prognosis of patients with HCC.

Methods

We searched for relevant articles in the CNKI, PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science databases. The 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated for combined overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) to assess the prognostic value of expression of SPARC in patients with HCC.

Results

In six of the studies, SPARC expression status was significantly associated with OS (combined hazard ratio [HR], 1.38; 95% CI, 1.0–1.82; Z = 2.27, P = 0.02) but not with DFS (combined HR, 0.79; 95% CI, 0.16–4.00, Z = 0.28, P = 0.78). Therefore, it cannot be assumed that upregulated SPARC expression has an effect on DFS in patients with HCC.

Conclusion

Elevated SPARC expression is associated with a low survival rate but not with DFS in patients with HCC. Further studies are needed to confirm our conclusions.

Registration

INPLASY registration number: INPLASY202180115. https://inplasy.com/inplasy-2021-8-0115/.

Introduction

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the sixth most prevalent cancer and the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths [1,2], with a rapidly increasing incidence and mortality rate [3]. HCC is usually diagnosed at an advanced and unresectable stage when only conventional treatment options can be used and has a median survival after diagnosis of 6–12 months [4,5]. Transarterial chemoembolization is currently the standard of care for HCC [6]. However, there is a significant disparity in the prognoses of individuals with unresectable HCC despite receiving the same treatment. Therefore, it is important to examine the prognostic indicators of HCC in clinical use.

Secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine (SPARC), also known as osteonectin, was initially identified in bone and endothelial cells [7,8]. It is a 32–35-kDa multifunctional collagen or calcium-binding extracellular matrix glycoprotein belonging to a group of matricellular proteins encoded by genes located at 5q33.1 and consists of a single polypeptide (285 amino acids) comprising the following three biological structural domains: an acidic N-terminal domain, follistatin-like domain, and calcium-binding extracellular domain [9–11]. The human SPARC gene is expressed in numerous tissues and organs, including the bone marrow, whole blood, lymph node, thymus, brain, cerebellum, retina, heart, smooth muscle, skeletal muscle, spinal cord, intestine, colon, adipocytes, kidney, liver, pancreas, thyroid and salivary glands, skin, ovary, uterus, placenta, cervix, and prostate gland [12]. SPARC is a stromal cell glycoprotein that participates in the remodeling of the extracellular matrix and is involved in the development and progression of malignancies [10,13–19]. SPARC has been found to enhance tumorigenesis and metastasis and is associated with a poor prognosis [20–24], especially in pancreatic cancer [25,26], prostate cancer [27], and lung cancer [28]. SPARC is linked to the prognosis of HCC and can increase the proliferation and migration of tumor cells [5,29,30]. Furthermore, it helps HCC cells to acquire a stem cell morphology and promotes epithelial-mesenchymal transition, which is associated with tumor progression and metastasis [31].

Several researchers have evaluated the correlation between SPARC levels in hepatic stellate cells after activation and the prognosis of patients with HCC and found that independent high expression of SPARC can lead to high recurrence and mortality rates [32]. Meanwhile, it has been shown that the incidence of SPARC methylation in HCC tissue is much higher than that in non-tumor tissues and that patients without SPARC methylation have a higher postoperative overall survival (OS) rate than patients with SPARC methylation [33]. However, there are few relevant studies on the prognostic impact of SPARC in patients with HCC, and the predictive significance of SPARC in these patients is unknown. The aim of this meta-analysis was to analyze the prognostic significance of SPARC in patients with HCC to provide an evidence-based platform for future studies.

Materials and methods

We registered this systematic review and meta-analysis with INPLASY (INPLASY202180115) and followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines for meta-analyses [34].

Database search strategy

We performed a systematic literature search of the CNKI, PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science databases from their inception to August 2021. The retrieval strategy was as follows: (1) PubMed: (“Carcinoma, Hepatocellular”[Mesh] OR “Carcinoma, Hepatocellular”[All Fields] OR “HCC”[All Fields] OR “liver cancer”[All Fields]) AND (“Osteonectin”[Mesh] OR “Osteonectin”[All Fields] OR “SPARC”[All Fields] OR “Secreted protein acidic and cysteine rich”[All Fields]) AND (“Prognosis”[Mesh] OR “Prognosis”[All Fields] OR “Prognostic”[All Fields] OR “Survival Analysis”[Mesh] OR “Survival”); (2) EMBASE: (“hepatocellular carcinoma”: ti, ab, kw OR hcc: ti, ab, kw OR “liver cancer”: ti, ab, kw) AND (osteonectin OR sparc OR secreted) AND protein AND acidic AND cysteine AND rich AND (prognosis: ti, ab, kw OR prognostic: ti, ab, kw OR survival: ti, ab, kw); (3) Web of Science: TOPIC: (hepatocellular carcinoma OR HCC OR liver cancer) AND TOPIC: (Osteonectin OR SPARC OR Secreted protein acidic and cysteine rich) AND TOPIC: (Prognosis OR Prognostic OR Survival); (4) CNKI: keywords (hepatocellular carcinoma OR HCC OR liver cancer) and (Prognosis OR Prognostic OR Survival) in Chinese.

Inclusion criteria

To be eligible for inclusion, the following criteria had to be fulfilled: (a) clinical study in patients with HCC; (b) SPARC expression in HCC measured using immunohistochemistry, quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction, or western blotting; (c) association between SPARC expression and survival outcomes reported; (d) hazard ratio [HR] and 95% confidence interval [CI] for OS according to SPARC status either reported or able to be estimated from the relevant published data.

Exclusion criteria

The following exclusion criteria were applied: (a) publication as a letter, editorial, abstract, review, case report, or expert opinion; (b) an in vitro or in vivo experiment; (c) HRs for OS with 95% CIs not reported and no Kaplan–Meier survival curves available; (d) duplicate article derived from an identical or overlapping patient population (only the most recent and/or complete one used); (e) inclusion of patients with a diagnosis of malignancies other than HCC.

Literature screening

The literature search and screening were performed by two researchers working independently. The titles, abstracts, and keywords were read briefly; the complete text was then reviewed and selected based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Finally, inclusion was determined by cross-checking; if the two researchers did not agree on the selection of a particular article, a third qualified researcher was asked to adjudicate.

Extraction of data

Information on the initial author, year of publication, number of study participants, sex ratio, and outcome indicators was collected and summarized using Excel 2019 software.

Quality evaluation of the literature

The quality of the included studies was appraised by two authors using the risk of bias assessment technique in the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Treatments 5.1.0, which is used to assess the risk of publication bias. Investigators and outcome assessors were blinded to all information on random sequence generation and allocation concealment. All articles were evaluated for completeness of outcome data and selective reporting of research outcomes.

Statistical methods

Stata 11.2 and RevMan 5.3 software were used to evaluate the relevant literature. All outcome indicators were continuous variables, and the data are expressed as the odds ratio (OR) with the 95% CI. Heterogeneity between the included studies was estimated. The Q test was performed to determine the heterogeneity of the I2 response. A P-value > 0.1 or an I2 value < 50% indicated statistically significant homogeneity, and a fixed-effects model was used to conduct the meta-analysis. A P-value < 0.1 or an I2 value > 50% indicated statistically significant heterogeneity, and a random-effects model was used with subgroup analysis to investigate the source of heterogeneity. The combined effect size test indicated a statistically significant difference at P ≤ 0.05.

Results

Search results

The initial systematic search identified 1235 studies. After eliminating duplicates, 195 articles remained. Based on the title and abstract screening, 72 irrelevant articles were excluded, and 45 were further screened for assessment of eligibility. Thirty-nine studies that did not meet our inclusion criteria were excluded, leaving six [32,33,35–38] for inclusion in the meta-analysis. Fig 1 shows the literature search and article selection processes.

Fig 1. Flow chart showing the process used to select articles for meta-analysis.

Fig 1

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Study characteristics and quality assessment

This meta-analysis included all studies published in the English language between 2009 and 2020. The studies included a total of 678 patients with HCC. Background data, including sex ratio, mean age, and duration of disease, were comparable between the study and control groups. The patient sample size ranged from 60 to 200 in the six studies. In all studies, SPARC was detected in tumor tissues, mesenchymal cells, or cancer cells by immunohistochemistry or quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. Stratification of SPARC expression differed between the studies. HRs for reported or estimated OS and disease-free survival (DFS) with 95% CIs were included. SPARC was mentioned as a predictor of poor prognosis in four studies, and only one [38] found that it had no effect on OS. SPARC was found to be a good predictor of outcomes in one study [35]. The patient characteristics are summarized in Table 1. Huang et al. used quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) to determine SPARC levels in 120 samples. OS and DFS were recorded [35]. Liu et al. recorded OS and used immunohistochemistry (IHC) to determine SPARC levels in 89 samples [36]. Yang et al. used IHC to determine SPARC levels in 79 samples. OS and DFS were recorded [37]. Ju et al. used qPCR to determine SPARC levels in 130 samples. OS and relapse-free survival (RFS) were recorded [32]. Zhang et al. recorded OS and used methylmion specific polymerase chain reaction (MSP) to determine SPARC levels in 60 samples [33]. Darweesh et al. recorded OS and used qPCR to determine SPARC levels in 200 samples [38].

Table 1. Background characteristics of the study population.

First author Country Method Subjects Sex
M/F		 Cell type/location Study group Control group SPARC Outcome Obtainment
+ -
Huang, et al. 2017 [35] China qPCR 120 110/10 Tumor HCC tumor tissues Tumor adjacent liver tissues 71 49 OS、DFS Multivariate
Liu 2020
[36]		 China IHC 89 36/7 Stroma Patients with HCC Healthy controls 11 78 OS Multivariate
Yang 2018
[37]		 China IHC 79 38/16 Tumor Patients with primary liver cancer Tumor adjacent liver tissues 35 44 OS、DFS Multivariate
Ju
2009
[32]		 China qPCR 130 112/18 Tumor Patients with HCC Healthy liver donors 85 45 OS、RFS Multivariate
Zhang 2012
[33]		 China MSP 60 9/51 Tumor HCC tumor tissues Nontumorous liver tissues 21 39 OS Multivariate
Darweesh
2018 [38]		 Egypt qPCR 200 160/40 Tumor Patients with HCC Healthy controls NA NA OS Multivariate
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Five reports clearly included the method of group assignment. Huang et al. used paired paraffin-embedded samples from patients with HCC who had undergone liver resection. Adjacent non-cancerous liver tissue samples were selected as the control group [35]. Liu el al. performed immunohistochemical assays in hepatic tissues collected from patients with HCC (study group) and healthy individuals (control group) [36]. Yang et al. selected patients with primary liver cancer who underwent surgery as the study group and tumor adjacent liver tissues as the control group [37]. Ju et al. selected patients with HCC matching the following criteria to form the study group: (1) pathologically diagnosed HCC; (2) no anticancer treatment or distant metastases before surgery; and (3) history of HCC resection, defined as macroscopically complete removal of the tumors. Meanwhile, a normal liver tissue pool from 10 healthy liver donors was assigned as the control group [32]. Zhang et al. selected HCC tissues as the study group and nontumorous tissues as the control group [33]. Darweesh et al. selected patients with HCC as the study group and healthy volunteers as the control group. Healthy paticipants were those who had normal liver enzyme levels and functions, negative results on viral hepatitis screening, and normal abdominal ultrasound scans [38]. Six did not mention blinding in the outcome analysis. Specific grouping information was not clearly described; only one study was evaluated as having a high risk of bias, and the degree of assignment bias was unknown in one study. Three studies did not specify whether testing was performed using blinded principles, and the amount of missing data was not specified in one article. Testing bias was identified in three studies. Some of the included studies did not describe the staging of HCC. The quality assessment results are shown in Fig 2.

Fig 2. Quality assessment chart.

Fig 2

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SPARC and overall survival

Six studies showed an association between SPARC expression and OS. There was considerable heterogeneity in OS in patients with HCC between the studies (χ2 = 26.96, P<0.001; I2 = 81%). The random-effects model was used for the analysis because the I2 value was >50%, and the combined HR for the six studies was 1.38 (95% CI 1.04–1.82; Z = 2.27, P = 0.02), indicating that upregulated expression of SPARC was significantly associated with OS in patients with HCC (Fig 3).

Fig 3. Forest plot showing the correlation between change in overall survival and secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine expression in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma.

Fig 3

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Two studies revealed the relationship between SPARC expression and DFS, as shown in Fig 4. There was significant heterogeneity in the data (τ2 = 1.23; χ2 = 26.96, P = 0.002; I2 = 90%). Therefore, a random-effects model was used for analysis; the combined HR for the two studies was 0.79 (95% CI, 0.16–4.00; Z = 0.28, P = 0.78), which did not indicate a statistically significant difference. Therefore, upregulated SPARC expression did not appear to affect DFS in patients with HCC.

Fig 4. Forest plot showing the correlation between disease-free survival and secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine expression in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma.

Fig 4

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Funnel plots (Figs 5 and 6) constructed to assess publication bias in the studies that included both OS and DFS showed an asymmetric distribution, indicating considerable publication bias.

Fig 5. Funnel plot of studies with overall survival as the evaluation index.

Fig 5

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Fig 6. Funnel plot showing disease-free survival as the evaluation index.

Fig 6

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Discussion

SPARC is attracting increasing interest as a potential prognostic biomarker in patients with cancer [10,12,39–43]. However, the link between the SPARC expression profile and patient survival is a matter of debate and seems to depend on the type of tumor [44,45]. There have been many studies on SPARC expression in patients with pancreatic [46–48], prostate [27,49], lung [28,50], breast [27,51] and other tumors in terms of carcinogenesis, metastasis, and prognosis [52,53]. However, although upregulated SPARC expression is thought to be associated with a favorable outcome [54], the functional role of SPARC in cancer varies according to tumor type and tissue environment [55]. SPARC expression has been demonstrated to both promote and inhibit various forms of tumor cell activity. Although the sample size in SPARC studies in HCC is very small, several studies have shown that SPARC can boost proliferation and migration of tumor cells and that it may be associated with the prognosis of HCC [5,31,56]. However, until now, there has been no meta-analysis of studies that have suggested the prognostic significance of SPARC in HCC.

Our meta-analysis of six eligible studies including a total of 678 patients is the first to systematically evaluate the role of SPARC in the prognosis of HCC. We found that patients with HCC who had high SPARC expression had a lower OS rate than patients without HCC did. When the HR value for DFS was examined, there was no relationship between expression of SPARC in patients with HCC and DFS. However, only two of the included studies included DFS evaluation and had conflicting results, which is presumably the reason for this negative finding, requiring further study. We also created funnel plots for OS and DFS to analyze bias and found them to be asymmetric, indicating that our results were unstable.

Other researchers have identified abnormal methylation of SPARC in some tumor cell lines and that SPARC methylation induces gene silencing and inhibition of tumor activity [57], whereas demethylating agents can change methylation status and restore gene expression. Therefore, upregulated expression of SPARC in patients with HCC is most likely attributable to methylation. SPARC methylation is more common in HCC tissue [37], and patients with SPARC methylation have a low overall postoperative survival rate. Moreover, multiple significant molecular processes involving SPARC have been found in malignant tumors in both the extracellular matrix and tumor microenvironment, including regulation of modulation, anti-adhesion, apoptosis, growth, migration, and invasion [53]. Furthermore, the tumor suppressor KLF4 decreases tumor invasion by downregulating the expression of SPARC [58]. These findings are consistent with the theory that high SPARC expression is associated with a poor prognosis in patients with HCC.

This research has some limitations. First, the sample size was limited to 678 patients, most of whom were from health centers or hospitals with adequate follow-up, and the quality of the data was variable, which may have affected our results. Second, given that most of the studies were retrospective, selection bias and information bias were inevitable. We identified some risk of bias (Fig 2), especially for allocation concealment. Third, although there is a link between SPARC expression and tumor stage, the TNM (tumor node metastasis) staging system was not used in any of the eligible studies. Therefore, the inclusion of patients with various disease stages may have had an impact on our findings, including for heterogeneity. Finally, we only included studies published in English, which may have resulted in the exclusion of relevant studies published in other languages. Furthermore, the number of relevant studies that have not been published is unknown. Therefore, further research is needed to confirm our present findings regarding the prognostic value of SPARC in patients with HCC.

Conclusion

This comprehensive review and meta-analysis found an association between high SPARC expression and a poor prognosis in patients with HCC. However, this association did not extend to DFS, possibly because DFS was rarely included in the eligible studies. Therefore, more research is needed to confirm our findings and investigate the molecular mechanisms and pathways that influence DFS.

Supporting information

S1 File. PRISMA 2010 checklist.

(DOCX)

Click here for additional data file. (31.2KB, docx)

Data Availability

All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information file.

Funding Statement

The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

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Decision Letter 0

Raj Kumar Koiri

24 Jan 2022

PONE-D-21-33504Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review and meta-analysisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Xia,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. The reviewer(s) recommended major revision to your manuscript. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.Please submit your revised manuscript by 28th February 2022. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

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Raj Kumar Koiri

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Reviewer Comments to the Author

Reviewer #1: 1&2&3. What are the justifications for the exclusion criteria? For instance, why were similar studies excluded, how was their ‘similarity’ measured, and how did the authors decide which study among similar studies to include?

The ‘Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews of treatments’ (please cite this resource/include it in the references) was used to evaluate publication bias; however, the criteria is different from what is described in the handbook. For instance, what does ‘Other bias’ mean?

The conclusions regarding overall survival and disease-free survival are supported by only 6 and 2 studies, respectively. Due to the small number of studies reviewed and as mentioned in the article, no comprehensive evidence is presented to support the conclusions.

4.A number of sections in this article contain grammatical errors, making it difficult to understand the text. Acronym definitions are not consistent in terms of letter case and whether the acronym is included in parenthesis or the other way around.

The ‘Country’ column in Table 1 seems to be the author’s affiliation, not the country.

Would it be possible to include figures of higher quality? It’s difficult to read the blurred text in figures.

Reviewer #2: The authors are presenting a novel meta-analysis to analyze the predictive significance of SPARC in Hepatocellular Carcinoma patients.

Regardless of the small sample size, the data presented was novel and can be utilized to build future research in trying to pinpoint the association between SPARC and HCC

I do not have any comments for the authors

Reviewer #3: The current manuscript presented a review and meta-analysis to evaluate the reported evidences in scientific domain in order to understand SPARC expression and the prognosis of patients with HCC. The attempt is worth trying but investigators left noticeable methodological flaws in conduct of this meta-analysis/reporting - making results less reliable. Some of Points are mentioned below:

Authors refer present work as Network Meta analysis which is incorrect. (L99)

Authors have not provided Search Strategy Algorithms. The described search strategy in manuscript is of poor quality.

Systematic Review part of manuscript is incomplete, and there is no qualitative synthesis of evidence based on previously reported work.

Authors report that present work included the studies between 2019 and 2020 (L173), however, Table 1 does not comply with that criteria. The manuscript has many such contradictions- seems authors need to verify their data and description text.

Reason for the selection of Random Effects Model is insufficient. Results are insufficiently described which makes difficult to follow the conclusion and discussion part of manuscript.

**********

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

PLoS One. 2022 Aug 18;17(8):e0273317. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0273317.r002

Author response to Decision Letter 0

26 Feb 2022

Reviewer #1:

1. 1&2&3. What are the justifications for the exclusion criteria? For instance, why were similar studies excluded, how was their ‘similarity’ measured, and how did the authors decide which study among similar studies to include?

Response: Thank you very much for your constructive and helpful suggestions. In this paper, similarity refers to different articles using the same case. In order to eliminate misunderstandings, we corrected the manuscript again. Please see Line 106-119.

2. The ‘Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews of treatments’ (please cite this resource/include it in the references) was used to evaluate publication bias; however, the criteria is different from what is described in the handbook. For instance, what does ‘Other bias’ mean?

Response: Thank you very much. The wrong statement has been corrected. The right quality evaluation of the literature is as flowed: The quality of the included studies was appraised by two authors using the risk bias assessment technique in the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Treatments 5.1.0, which assesses the risk of publication bias. Investigators and outcome assessors were blinded to all information on random sequence generation and allocation concealment. All articles were evaluated for completeness of outcomes data and selective reporting of research outcomes. Please see Line 130-136.

3. The conclusions regarding overall survival and disease-free survival are supported by only 6 and 2 studies, respectively. Due to the small number of studies reviewed and as mentioned in the article, no comprehensive evidence is presented to support the conclusions.

Response: Thanks a lot. Although only six studies were included in terms of overall survival, data analysis showed that increased expression of SPARC was significantly associated with OS differences in HCC patients. Therefore, the expression of SPARC has an impact on HCC patients, but more high-quality studies are needed to confirm this outcome in the future. This belongs to the limitations of this meta-analysis. Please see Line 256-268.

4. A number of sections in this article contain grammatical errors, making it difficult to understand the text. Acronym definitions are not consistent in terms of letter case and whether the acronym is included in parenthesis or the other way around.

The ‘Country’ column in Table 1 seems to be the author’s affiliation, not the country.

Response: Thank you very much for your helpful suggestions. We invited native English speakers to polish the language of this paper. In addition, Table 1 has been checked and the wrong words have been removed in revised version.

5. Would it be possible to include figures of higher quality? It’s difficult to read the blurred text in figures.

Response: Thank you for your valuable suggestions. All figures have been checked. The figures of higher quality have been added instead of the old figures. Please see the figure files.

Reviewer #2: The authors are presenting a novel meta-analysis to analyze the predictive significance of SPARC in Hepatocellular Carcinoma patients.

Regardless of the small sample size, the data presented was novel and can be utilized to build future research in trying to pinpoint the association between SPARC and HCC

I do not have any comments for the authors.

Response: Thank you very much for your constructive and helpful suggestions.

Reviewer #3: The current manuscript presented a review and meta-analysis to evaluate the reported evidences in scientific domain in order to understand SPARC expression and the prognosis of patients with HCC. The attempt is worth trying but investigators left noticeable methodological flaws in conduct of this meta-analysis/reporting - making results less reliable. Some of Points are mentioned below:

1. Authors refer present work as Network Meta analysis which is incorrect. (L99)

Response: Thank you very much for your helpful suggestions. The word “network meta-analyses” has been modified to “meta-analyses”. Please see Line 88.

2. Authors have not provided Search Strategy Algorithms. The described search strategy in manuscript is of poor quality.

Response: Thank you very much for your constructive comments. The detailed search strategy has been added into the revised manuscript. Please see Line 90-105.

The retrieval strategy was as follows: (1) PubMed: (“Carcinoma, Hepatocellular”[Mesh] OR “Carcinoma, Hepatocellular”[All Fields] OR “HCC”[All Fields] OR “liver cancer”[All Fields]) AND (“Osteonectin”[Mesh] OR “Osteonectin”[All Fields] OR “SPARC”[All Fields] OR “Secreted protein acidic and cysteine rich”[All Fields]) AND (“Prognosis”[Mesh] OR “Prognosis”[All Fields] OR “Prognostic”[All Fields] OR “Survival Analysis”[Mesh] OR “Survival”); (2) Embase: (“hepatocellular carcinoma”: ti, ab, kw OR hcc: ti, ab, kw OR “liver cancer”: ti, ab, kw) AND (osteonectin OR sparc OR secreted) AND protein AND acidic AND cysteine AND rich AND (prognosis: ti, ab, kw OR prognostic: ti, ab, kw OR survival: ti, ab, kw); (3) Web of Science: TOPIC: (hepatocellular carcinoma OR HCC OR liver cancer) AND TOPIC: (Osteonectin OR SPARC OR Secreted protein acidic and cysteine rich) AND TOPIC: (Prognosis OR Prognostic OR Survival); (4) CNKI: keywords (hepatocellular carcinoma OR HCC OR liver cancer) and (Prognosis OR Prognostic OR Survival) in Chinese.

3. Systematic Review part of manuscript is incomplete, and there is no qualitative synthesis of evidence based on previously reported work.

Response: Thank you very much. Systematic Review part of manuscript has been modified (Line 149-155). The initial systematic search identified 1235 studies. After eliminating duplicates, 195 articles remained. Based on the title and abstract screening, 72 irrelevant articles were excluded, and 45 were further screened for assessment of eligibility. Thirty-nine studies that did not meet our inclusion criteria were excluded, leaving six for inclusion in the meta-analysis. Fig 1 shows the literature search and article selection processes.

4. Authors report that present work included the studies between 2019 and 2020 (L173), however, Table 1 does not comply with that criteria. The manuscript has many such contradictions- seems authors need to verify their data and description text.

Response: Thank you very much for your kind comments. The wrong word “2019” has been modified to “2009”. Please see Line 161.

5. Reason for the selection of Random Effects Model is insufficient. Results are insufficiently described which makes difficult to follow the conclusion and discussion part of manuscript.

Response: Thank you very much. In statistical analysis, the Q test was used to determine the size of I2 response heterogeneity: if P >0.1 and I2<50%, it indicates statistical homogeneity, and a fixed-effect model was used to conduct the meta-analysis; if P<0.1 or I2>50%, it indicates statistical heterogeneity, and a random effect model was used to conduct the meta-analysis and subgroup analysis to investigate the source of heterogeneity [1, 2]. Therefore, in this study, a randomized controlled model was selected due to I2>50%. Meanwhile, the confusing sentence has been removed in revised version and the right reason has been added into the revised manuscript. Please see Line 190-191.

References

1. Sohouli MH, Fatahi S, Lari A, Lotfi M, Seifishahpar M, Gaman MA, et al. The effect of paleolithic diet on glucose metabolism and lipid profile among patients with metabolic disorders: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr. 2021:1-12. Epub 2021/01/26. doi: 10.1080/10408398.2021.1876625. PubMed PMID: 33492173.

2. Schwingshackl L, Zahringer J, Nitschke K, Torbahn G, Lohner S, Kuhn T, et al. Impact of intermittent energy restriction on anthropometric outcomes and intermediate disease markers in patients with overweight and obesity: systematic review and meta-analyses. Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr. 2021;61(8):1293-304. Epub 2020/05/05. doi: 10.1080/10408398.2020.1757616. PubMed PMID: 32363896.

Attachment

Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx

Click here for additional data file. (26.9KB, docx)

Decision Letter 1

Raj Kumar Koiri

9 May 2022

PONE-D-21-33504R1Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review and meta-analysisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Xia,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Jun 23 2022 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.

  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Raj Kumar Koiri

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: I have no further comments for the authors.

Reviewer #3: Thank you for providing the additional information in respect of comments. The Queries for the manuscript have been addressed well.

Reviewer #4: In the manuscript titled “Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review and meta-analysis” the authors, with the help of data mining evaluated the SPARC expression and posed SPARC as a prognostic marker in hepatocellular carcinoma patients. This is novel in terms of the project plan without any wet laboratory experiments but only with the help of previous work and literature search with certain inclusion and exclusion criteria. The current manuscript is well written with some minor english grammar and typo mistakes. The pointwise comments are as follows:

1. Though the manuscript is well organized but is not easy to understand what is the goal/aim of this study.

2. When there are many other proteins (PIMD 33312759, 34591393, 32439236, 28631558) studied in the HCC why SPARC has been chosen, and what is the rationale behind it?

3. It would be better if the author had defined, what is “overall survival” and what is “disease-free survival”.

4. The entire manuscript is based on data mining and six paper has been selected which is a very small number.

5. The total sample size based upon the 6 papers is 678, according to table 1 (120+89+79+130+60+200 = 678), why and how it is mentioned 698 in line 233 page 13 and line 256 page 14.

6. This manuscript is not a regular research article, many things in the manuscript have to be defined, like “method of group assignment,” (line 177 page 10) and “blinding in the outcome analysis” (line 178 page 10).

7. Instead of presenting in the tabular form, it would be better if all the 6 studies were described with a separate heading including the sample size, methodology used, and putative outcome.

8. Some sentences are incoherent, e.g. “The p53/p21Cip1/Waf1 pathway enhances the effects of radiotherapy and chemotherapy” what does this sentence mean, and how it is correlated with the study?

9. While talking about the limitations of the paper, on page no 14, it is mentioned “other types of biases” in line 260., It is better to describe the “other biases” or just delete this line.

10. What does TNM stand for in line 262, page 14?

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: Yes: Ratnakar Tripathi

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

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Decision Letter 2

Raj Kumar Koiri

8 Aug 2022

Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review and meta-analysis

PONE-D-21-33504R2

Dear Dr. Xia,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Raj Kumar Koiri

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

The authors have satisfactorily answered the reviewers comment and the manuscript can be accepted.

Reviewers' comments:

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Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

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Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #4: In the manuscript titled “Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review and meta-analysis” the authors, have answered all the questions and edited according.

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Reviewer #4: Yes: Ratnakar Tripathi

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Acceptance letter

Raj Kumar Koiri

10 Aug 2022

PONE-D-21-33504R2

Prognostic value of SPARC in hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Dear Dr. Xia:

I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org.

If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org.

Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access.

Kind regards,

PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff

on behalf of

Dr. Raj Kumar Koiri

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Associated Data

    This section collects any data citations, data availability statements, or supplementary materials included in this article.

    Supplementary Materials

    S1 File. PRISMA 2010 checklist.

    (DOCX)

    Click here for additional data file. (31.2KB, docx)
    Attachment

    Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx

    Click here for additional data file. (26.9KB, docx)
    Attachment

    Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx

    Click here for additional data file. (21.5KB, docx)

    Data Availability Statement

    All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information file.

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