Elevated circulating macrophage inhibitory cytokine 1 is a biological marker for the diagnosis and prognosis of osteosarcoma.

Osteosarcoma is among the most frequently occurring bone tumors in infants and teenagers. However, despite its widespread prevalence, no effective diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for osteosarcoma are known. Macrophage inhibitory cytokine 1 (MIC-1) has been considered a promising biological marker of various tumor types. However, the possible role of circulating MIC-1 as a screening biomarker for osteosarcoma remains to be elucidated. The present study evaluated the circulating levels of MIC-1 in patients with osteosarcoma with the aim of elucidating its effect on the diagnosis and prognosis of this specific tumor. The circulating levels of MIC-1 were measured via an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay in 300 individuals, including 100 patients with osteosarcoma, 100 patients with benign bone tumors, and 100 healthy subjects, and its correlation with clinicopathological characteristics was then evaluated. Various analyses were performed to determine its utility in diagnosis and prognosis. The levels of circulating MIC-1 were increased considerably in patients with osteosarcoma. The patients bearing larger tumors, those with distant metastases, and those with later-stage tumors had relatively higher levels of MIC-1. According to the multivariate logistic regression analysis, a high level of circulating MIC-1 was an independent variable for distant metastases. Receiver operating characteristic analysis revealed MIC-1 as a possible biological marker for distinguishing patients from healthy controls. Patients with osteosarcoma with higher levels of MIC-1 had relatively higher risk of mortality. Furthermore, multivariate data analysis on general survival rate revealed that a high level of circulating MIC-1 was a prognostic indicator of osteosarcoma. These findings suggest that an elevated level of circulating MIC-1 is a novel potential diagnostic and prognostic biomarker for osteosarcoma.