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Background/aim: MicroRNAs (miRNAs) have been highlighted as non-invasive clinical biomarkers in liquid biopsy. This study aimed to investigate the clinical significance of circulating tumor suppressors, precursor-miR-488 (pre-miR-488) and miR-488-5p, in the blood of patients with gastric cancer (GC)., Materials and Methods: The expression levels of pre-miR-488 and miR-488-5p in tumor tissues and blood were measured using RT-qPCR, and the clinicopathological and prognostic significance of their expression was assessed in patients with GC. Next, pathway analysis of miR-488-5p expression in GC tissues was performed by gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) using the TCGA dataset. Finally, pre-miR-488 in exosomes from the plasma of GC patients was analyzed using RT-qPCR., Results: Both pre-miR-488 and miR-488-5p were down-regulated in tumor tissues, whereas their expression in the blood was significantly higher in patients with GC than in healthy controls. Low expression of pre-miR-488 or miR-488-5p in the blood was associated with poor prognosis in patients with GC. Furthermore, low pre-miR-488 expression in the blood was an independent poor prognostic factor for overall survival. miR-488-5p expression tended to be negatively correlated with the expression of gene sets involved in epithelial-mesenchymal transition and hypoxia. pre-miR-488 was detected in exosomes isolated from the plasma of patients with GC., Conclusion: Circulating pre-miR-488 and miR-488-5p expression in the blood may serve as novel prognostic biomarkers for patients with GC, predicting clinical outcomes and guiding therapeutic strategies., (Copyright © 2025 International Institute of Anticancer Research (Dr. George J. Delinasios), All rights reserved.)

Introduction: This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of perioperative dysphagia rehabilitation in older adult patients diagnosed with gastric cancer who underwent gastrectomy., Materials and Methods: This retrospective study included 149 patients over 80 years who underwent gastrectomies between January 2000 and December 2020. The patients were divided into two groups based on the intervention of the dysphagia rehabilitation team (DRT group: n = 101) and the non-intervention control group (C group: n = 48). Inverse probability weighting (IPW) analysis was used to reduce bias caused by potential confounding., Results: The incidence of overall complications was significantly lower in the DRT group (odds ratio [OR]; 0.27[0.08-0.93]), among which the incidence of postoperative pneumonia (OR; 0.07[0.01-0.43]) and aspiration pneumonia (OR; 0.05[0.01-0.44] was significantly reduced. Ten patients developed postoperative pneumonia; seven were in the C group, and three were in DRT group. Sixty percent of these patients had preoperative comorbidities related to the respiratory system. Regarding the time of onset of aspiration pneumonia, two patterns were observed: onset within a short period after surgery and onset after the start of eating. In contrast, five patients underwent preoperative dysphagia rehabilitation in the DRT group. Among them, postoperative aspiration pneumonia was prevented in four patients, and the others were prevented from severe pneumonitis by the intervention of the dysphagia rehabilitation team., Discussion: Perioperative intervention in dysphagia rehabilitation is not only associated with reduced postoperative pneumonia but also creates awareness in the medical staff and promotes careful observation of swallowing in patients, thereby controlling the incidence of postoperative pneumonia. The perioperative intervention of the dysphagia rehabilitation team is useful for older adult patients with gastric cancer., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest Atsushi Yasuda, Yutaka Kimura, Takushi Yasuda, Yoko Hiraki, Takaomi Hagi, Hiroaki Kato, Osamu Shiraishi, Masayuki Shinkai, Motohiro Imano, and Haruhiko Imamoto declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)