Prognostic value of cancer stem cell marker CD133 expression in non-small cell lung cancer: a systematic review.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the correlation between CD133-positive non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and clinicopathological features and its impact on survival.

METHODS: A search in the Pubmed, Embase and Wanfang databases (up to July 15, 2013) was performed. Only articles in which CD133 antigen was detected in situ localization by immunohistochemical staining were included. This meta-analysis was done using RevMan 5.2 software. Outcomes included overall survival and various clinicopathological features.

RESULTS: A total of 1004 NSCLC patients from 11 studies were included. Meta-analysis showed that CD133 expression patients had a significant worse 5-year overall survival compared to the low expression ones (RR = 3.19, 95% CI: 2.05-4.98, P<0.0001 fixed random). With respect to clinicopathological features, CD133 expression by IHC method was closely correlated with tumor T stage (OR = 0.91, 95% CI: 0.59-1.39, P = 0.67 fixed-effect) and tumor grade (OR = 1.20, 95% CI: 0.80-1.79, P = 0.37 fixed-effect).

CONCLUSION: CD133-positive NSCLC patients had worse prognosis, and was associated with common clinicopathological poor prognostic factors.