Prognostic and clinicopathological significance of YAP in Colorectal carcinoma: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract Background: YAP is a protein encoded by the YAP gene in humans. Numerous studied showed that YAP expressed in colorecal carcinoma (CRC) and has a association with poor clinical outcomes. However, the association between YAP expression level with prognostic and clinicopathological features in CRC patients remains unclear. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis to investigate the prognostics effect of YAP expression on CRC patients.Methods: A systematic search of the PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane Library and Embase databases was conducted based on predefined selection criteria in April 26, 2020. The correlation between YAP expression level and survival outcomes or clinicopathological characteristic was analyzed by hazard ratios (HR) or odds ratios (OR) at 95% confdence intervals (CI).Results: 12 studies were included, with a total of 2286 CRC patients,in our meta-analysis.the results show the relationship between YAP expression level with overall survival (OS) in CRC patients HR (2.02, 95%CI 1.67-2.44 I2 =19.7% P= 0.25) . In addition to clinicpathological features, CRC patients with overexpression of YAP were tend to advanced TNM stage(OR:2.99, 95%CI 2.11-4.25, I2=0.0%, P=0.699), lymph node metastasis(OR:3.73, 95% CI 2.63-5.30, I2=4.8%, P=0.386), distant metastasis(OR:3.03, 95% CI 1.21-7.56, I2=65.3%, P=0.021), tumor invasion depth HR (2.82 95%CI 1.65-4.83 I2=0.0%, p=0.413), but have no associated with sex, tumor size, tumor location and tumor differentiation.Conclusion: The results of this meta-analysis show that high expression of YAP tended to have a worse progosis and have great influence on clinicpathological features. which means YAP may serve as a promising indicator in the prediction of prognosis and clinicopathological features in CRC patients.