Association of microRNA polymorphisms with the risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma in a Chinese population:a case-control study

Background:MicroRNA（miRNA） polymorphisms may alter miRNA-related processes,and they likely contribute to cancer susceptibility.Various studies have investigated the associations between genetic variants in several key miRNAs and the risk of human cancers;however,few studies have focused on head and neck squamous cell carcinoma（HNSCC） risk.This study aimed to evaluate the associations between several key miRNA polymorphisms and HNSCC risk in a Chinese population.Methods:In this study,we genotyped five common single-nucleotide polymorphisms（SNPs） in several key miRNAs（miR-149 rs2292832,miR-146 a rs2910164,miR-605 rs2043556,miR-608 rs4919510,and miR-196a2 rs11614913） and evaluated the associations between these SNPs and HNSCC risk according to cancer site with a case-control study including 576 cases and 1552 controls,which were matched by age and sex in a Chinese population.Results:The results revealed that miR-605 rs2043556[dominant model:adjusted odds ratio（OR） 0.71,95%confidence interval（CI） 0.58-0.88;additive model:adjusted OR 0.74,95%CI 0.62-0.89]and miR-196a2 rs11614913（dominant model:adjusted OR 1.36,95%C11.08-1.72;additive model:adjusted OR 1.28,95%C11.10-1.48） were significantly associated with the risk of oral squamous cell carcinoma（OSCC）.Furthermore,when these two loci were evaluated together based on the number of putative risk alleles（rs2043556 A and rs11614913 G）,a significant locus-dosage effect was noted on the risk of OSCC(Ptrend < 0.001).However,no significant association was detected between the other three SNPs（miR-149 rs2292832,miR- 146 a rs2910164,and miR-608 rs4919510） and HNSCC risk.Conclusion:Our study provided the evidence that miR-605 rs2043556 and miR-196a2 rs11614913 may have an impact on genetic susceptibility to OSCC in Chinese population.