Taurine up-regulated gene 1 (TUG1) is a
long non-coding RNA (
lncRNA), has been reported that be dysregulated in various
tumors, involved in proliferation and apoptosis in a variety of
tumor cells. To detect the clinical significance of TUG1 expression in
tumor patients, we carried out current systematic review and meta-analysis investigating its relation with the prognosis and clinicopathological features of
cancers. A total of 15 studies comprise 1560 patients were analyzed. The pooled results showed that no significant relationship between high TUG1 expression and overall survival (OS) (HR = 1.28, 95% CI: 0.96-1.69, P = 0.091) in various
tumors. In the subgroup analysis by
cancer type, elevated TUG1 expression was associated with poorer survival in
cancer patients with high TUG1 expression subgroup but better survival in patients with low TUG1 expression subgroup. Over-expression of TUG1 associated with significantly unfavorable survival for
bladder cancer (HR=2.67, 95% CI: 1.47-4.87, P = 0.001). Up-regulation of TUG1 correlated with distant
metastasis (DM) (OR = 4.22, 95% CI: 2.66-6.70, P < 0.001) and
tumor differentiation (OR = 2.45, 95% CI: 1.28-4.70, P = 0.007), but failed to show inline to gender (OR = 1.04, 95% CI: 0.77-1.42, P = 0.774), age (OR = 0.75, 95% CI: 0.51-1.10, P = 0.136),
lymph node metastasis (LNM) (OR = 1.45, 95% CI: 0.85-2.50, P = 0.177), and TNM stage (OR = 0.55, 95% CI: 0.17-1.81, P = 0.326). The overall results suggest
lncRNA TUG1 may be a useful prognostic
biomarker in
cancer patients.