International journal of cancer. Journal international du cancer
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MicroRNA (miRNA) opens up a new field for molecular diagnosis of cancer. However, the role of circulating miRNAs in plasma/serum in cancer diagnosis is not clear. The aim of this study was to investigate whether plasma miRNAs can be used as biomarkers for the early detection of colorectal carcinoma (CRC). ⋯ More importantly, these 2 miRNAs also could discriminate advanced adenomas from controls and yielded an AUC of 0.769 for miR-29a and 0.749 for miR-92a. Combined ROC analyses using these 2 miRNAs revealed an elevated AUC of 0.883 with 83.0% sensitivity and 84.7% specificity in discriminating CRC, and AUC of 0.773 with 73.0% sensitivity and 79.7% specificity in discriminating advanced adenomas. Collectively, these data suggest that plasma miR-29a and miR-92a have strong potential as novel noninvasive biomarkers for early detection of CRC.