Association between five types of Tumor Necrosis Factor-α Gene Polymorphism and Hepatocellular Carcinoma Risk: A Meta-Analysis

Abstract Background: Research focusing on the relationship between five types of tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) SNPs and the risk of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) were still controversial. Hereby, we performed a meta-analysis to determine the association between TNF-α promoter SNPs: -1031 T/C, -863 C/A, -857 C/T, -308 G/A, and -238 G/A with HCC risk. Methods: We interrogated articles from journal database: PubMed, Pro-Quest, EBSCO, Science Direct, and Springer to determine the relationship between five types of SNPs in TNF-α gene with HCC risk. RevMan 5.3 software was used for analysis in fixed/random effect models. Results: This meta-analysis included 23 potential articles from 2004-2018 with 3,237 HCC cases and 4,843 controls. We found that SNP -863 C/A were associated with a significantly increased HCC risk (A vs C, OR=1.31, 95% CI=1.03-1.67). Similar results were obtained in -857 C/T (TT/CT vs CC, OR=1.31, 95% CI=1.06-1.62), -308 G/A (AA vs GG, OR=3.14, 95% CI=2.06-4.79), and -238 G/A (AA vs GG, OR=3.87, 95% CI=1.32-11.34). While no associations were observed between SNP TNF-α -1031 T/C and HCC risk.Conclusions: The present meta-analysis showed that TNFα SNPs -863C/A, -857 C/T, -308 G/A, and -238 G/A were associated with the risk of HCC.