Relationships between VEGF protein expression and pathological characteristics of diffuse large B cell lymphoma: a meta-analysis.

We carried out the current meta-analysis of relevant cohort studies in an attempt to investigate the relationships between vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) expression and pathological characteristics of diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL). The following electronic databases were searched for relevant articles without any language restrictions: Web of Science (1945 ~ 2013), the Cochrane Library Database (Issue 12, 2013), PubMed (1966 ~ 2013), EMBASE (1980 ~ 2013), CINAHL (1982 ~ 2013), and the Chinese Biomedical Database (CBM) (1982 ~ 2013). Meta-analyses were conducted with the use of STATA software (version 12.0, Stata Corporation, College Station, TX, USA). Odds ratios (ORs) and its 95 % confidence interval (95 % CI) were calculated. Nine clinical cohort studies with a total of 789 DLBCL patients met our inclusion criteria. The meta-analysis results showed that patients with positive VEGF expression had higher international prognostic index (IPI) scores than VEGF-negative patients (OR = 5.12, 95 % CI = 2.70 ~ 9.71, P < 0.001). There was a significantly positive association between positive VEGF expression and evaluated lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels (OR = 2.50, 95 % CI = 1.36 ~ 4.60, P = 0.003). We also found that patients with positive B symptoms had increased level of VEGF expression (OR = 2.02, 95 % CI = 1.08 ~ 3.77, P = 0.027). The findings of our meta-analysis provide reliable evidence that VEGF expression may be strongly correlated with pathological characteristics of DLBCL.