Soluble intercellular cell adhesion molecule-1 in lung cancer: A meta-analysis

Background: Many recent studies have investigated the prognostic, diagnostic, and progressive features of soluble intercellular cell adhesion molecule-1 (sICAM-1) in lung cancer patients, but the results remained inconsistent. This study aimed to explore the value of serum sICAM-1 in patients with lung cancer. Methods: A comprehensive systematic literature search in the Wanfang databases, china national knowledge infrastructure, Pubmed, and Embase was carried out update to June 15, 2019. The standard mean difference (SMD), hazard ratio (HR), and 95% confidence interval (95% CI) were applied to investigate the effect sizes. Results: 23 observational studies were included. According to our results, the serum sICAM-1 concentrations in patients with lung cancer were significantly higher than that in controls (healthy controls: SMD: 4.08, 95% CI: 3.14-5.02, P < 0.001; benign lung diseases controls : SMD: 1.48, 95% CI: 0.23-2.73,P = 0.02). Fortunately, a subgroup analysis was performed by language, treatment status, and lung cancer types, and the statistical results were similar. Serum sICAM-1 levels were markedly higher in stage III/IV than stage I/II (SMD: 1.96, 95% CI: 1.08-2.84, P < 0.001), Additionally, lung cancer patients with lymph node metastasis had a higher concentrations of serum sICAM-1(SMD: 1.83, 95% CI: 0.95-2.72, P < 0.001), as well as with distant metastasis (SMD: 0.86, 95% CI: 0.47-1.25, P < 0.001). Additionally, patients with higher sICAM-1 levels were related to a significantly poorer prognosis (progression free survival: HR: 1.16, 95% CI: 1.07-1.26, P< 0.001; overall survival: HR: 1.45, 95% CI: 1.17-1.79, P = 0.001). Conclusions: Our study suggested that serum sICAM-1 levels may act as a potential marker for diagnosing lung cancer and predicting its staging, and were negatively correlated with prognosis of lung cancer.