miR-21, miR-221 and miR-222 expression and prostate cancer recurrence among obese and non-obese cases

Recent evidence shows that certain microRNAs (miRNAs) play a role in both obesity and prostate cancer recurrence, but the association between the expression of these miRNAs and obesity in prostate cancer recurrence is unknown. In this study, we examined the effect of the interaction between obesity and miR-21, miR-221 or miR-222 expression on prostate cancer recurrence among 28 recurrent and 37 non-recurrent prostate cancer cases. miRNA expression was determined using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. Cox proportional hazard models adjusting for age at diagnosis, clinical stage and Gleason score were used to estimate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) for recurrence free survival. A significantly (P=0.014) higher proportion of recurrent cases (78.6%) than non-recurrent cases (48.6%) had a low expression of miR-21 and the difference was more prominent in obese than non-obese patients. Multivariate analysis showed that the expression of miR-21 was an independent risk factor for recurrence in obese (HR=6.15, 95% CI=1.04–36.48, P=0.045), but not in non-obese (HR=1.28, 95% CI=0.30–5.49, P=0.74) cases. A significant association with recurrence was not observed for the expression of miR-221 and miR-222. In summary, our findings show that miR-21 is associated with prostate cancer recurrence after radical prostatectomy and suggest that the differential expression of miR-21 is more prominent in obese than in non-obese cases. Future larger studies are warranted to confirm these initial findings and to elucidate the mechanisms involved.