Serum circulating miRNA-342-3p as a potential diagnostic biomarker in parathyroid carcinomas: A pilot study

Objective To compare the serum miRNA expression profiles between patients with benign and malignant parathyroid tumours. Background Despite recent advances in molecular biology, a histological tissue biopsy is still the method of choice used to diagnose most cancers. The preoperative cytology is not an applicable method for diagnosis of parathyroid cancer (PC); therefore, huge interest exists in terms of finding alternative methodologies to seek specific cancer biomarkers. Design A retrospective cross-sectional study. Patients and Methods Serum samples of patients with PC (n = 13) and parathyroid adenoma (PA) (n = 11), age (p = .999) and sex (p = .999) were matched and examined via the simultaneous comparative expression analysis of 754 microRNAs (miRNAs). The << TaqMan OpenArray Human MicroRNA Panel >> (Applied Biosystems) was used to conduct real-time PCRs using the << QuantStudio 12K Flex >> station (Life Technologies). Results According to the results of a pilot study, significant changes in expression levels between the PC group and the PA group (control) (p < .05) were observed for 17 miRNAs. Among them, the downregulation of miRNA-342-3p met the Benjamini-Hochberg adjustment criteria for multiple comparisons (p = .02). Conclusions Serum miRNA-342-3p could be a promising biomarker for PC to improve diagnosis and prognosis.