Evaluation of prognostic usefulness of long noncoding RNA GAS5 and FAL1 in papillary thyroid carcinoma.

Genetic studies on cancers have revealed that lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 are overexpressed in some cancerous cells. The aim of the present investigation was to evaluate the roles of lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 gene expression changes in the diagnosis and prognosis of patients with papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC). In a case-control investigation, we recruited a total of 140 formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues of PTC, including 70 cancerous and noncancerous tissues. Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction was used to determine the lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 level of gene expression in the two tissue groups. The association between the clinicopathological characteristics of patients and the expression level of lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 was evaluated. Our findings revealed that the level of expression in the lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 genes was significantly upregulated in thyroid cancerous tissues (P < 0.003 and P < 0.040, respectively). The expression of lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 revealed a significant association with tumor node metastasis staging (P < 0.042 and P < 0.001, respectively). It seems that the lncRNA-GAS5 and lncRNA-FAL1 genes play an oncogenic role in PTC. The two genes have a significant potential prognostic value and may likely be used as novel therapeutic targets for PTC patients in the future.