A novel long non-coding RNATCONS_00001798 is downregulated and predicts survival in patients with non-small cell lung cancer.

The morbidity and mortality rates of patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) are increasing worldwide. Previous studies have demonstrated that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) may serve critical roles in oncogenesis and cancer progression. The present study aimed to investigate the expression of lncRNA TCONS_00001798 and the clinicopathological factors and prognosis of patients with NSCLC. Reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) was used to measure the expression of TCONS_00001798 in 118 paired NSCLC and adjacent non-tumor tissues. The association between TCONS_00001798 expression and patient clinicopathological factors and survival rates was subsequently analyzed. The results demonstrated that the expression of TCONS_00001798 was significantly downregulated in NSCLC tissues compared with adjacent non-tumor tissues (P<0.001). Additionally, the expression of TCONS_00001798 was negatively associated with lymph node metastasis (P<0.001) and an advanced pathological stage (P=0.003). A Kaplan-Meier analysis demonstrated that decreased TCONS_00001798 expression was significantly associated with shorter overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) rates (each P<0.001). Furthermore, the results of multivariate analyses revealed that TCONS_00001798 expression may serve as an independent predictor for OS and DFS rates (each P=0.001). Therefore, the present study demonstrated that TCONS_00001798 may be involved in the oncogenesis and progression of NSCLC and that TCONS_00001798 may be a potential diagnostic and therapeutic target in patients with NSCLC.