Prognosis value of HIF-1α expression in patients with non-small cell lung cancer

Hypoxia-inducible factor 1 (HIF-1) is a transcription factor that plays a critical role in the development and progression of tumors. Various studies evaluating the prognostic value of HIF-1α in patients with lung cancer (LC) remain controversial. To comprehensively and quantitatively summarize the evidence on the effect of HIF-1α expression on the survival of patients with LC, a meta-analysis was carried out. Electronic databases were used to identify published studies before August 31st, 2013. Studies were assessed for quality using REMARK. Data were collected comparing overall survival in patients with high HIF-1α expression with those with low expression. Totally, 13 papers including 1420 patients were subjected to final analysis. The combined hazard ratio (HR) was 1.60 (95% CI: 1.14–2.25, P=0.007), suggesting that high expression of HIF-1α was an indicator of poor prognosis. Further, when stratified by LC histological type (SCLC and NSCLC), study region (Asia and Europe), cut-off values (10%), tumor stage (I–III and I–IV), antibody for IHC (H1α67 and ESEE 122), and HR estimated method (univariate/multivariate analysis), most of the results were statistically significant. Taken together, this meta-analysis revealed that HIF-1α overexpression might be a predicative factor of poor prognosis for NSCLC particularly in Asia. •We quantitatively summarized 13 studies by means of meta-analysis.•The relation of HIF-1α expression with lung cancer has been clarified.•HIF-1α overexpression might be a predicative factor of poor prognosis for NSCLC.