Decreased expression of insulin-like growth factor binding protein 6 is associated with gastric adenocarcinoma prognosis

The present study aimed to investigate the expression and prognostic significance of insulin-like growth factor binding protein 6 (IGFBP-6) in gastric adenocarcinoma. The expression of IGFBP-6 was examined in 263 specimens from gastric adenocarcinoma patients using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR), western blotting and immunohistochemical (IHC) staining. The association between IGFBP-6 expression, clinicopathological factors and clinical outcomes was investigated. Akaike information criterion (AIC) and Harrell's concordance index (c-index) were used to evaluate the accuracy of the predictive prognosis. RT-qPCR and western blotting results showed that IGFBP-6 mRNA expression was lower in the tumors compared with that in adjacent non-tumor tissues. IGFBP-6 showed significantly decreased expression in 170 out of 263 patients based on IHC data and this was associated with a larger tumor size (P