Association between p16 Promoter Methylation and Thyroid Cancer Risk: A Meta-analysis

Background: The aim of the meta-analysis was to derive a more precise assessment of the association betweenp16 promoter methylation and thyroid cancer risk. Materials and
Methods: The PubMed, Web of Sciencedatabases and Chinese CNKI were searched for relevant articles. Ultimately, seventeen case–control studieswere included with a total of 804 thyroid cancer cases and 487 controls analysis by R Software (R version 3.1.2)including meta. Crude odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals were calculated using the random-effectsmodel which were used to assess the strength of relationship between p16 methylation and lung carcinogenesis.Funnel plots were carried out to evaluate publication bias.
Results: The meta-analysis results showed that thefrequency of p16 promoter methylation in cancer tissue/blood was significantly higher than that normal tissue/blood (OR=5.46, 95%CI 3.12-9.55, P<0.0001) by random effects model with small heterogeneity.
Conclusions:Thus, p16 promoter methylation may be associated with thyroid cancer risk.