Decreased expression of TRIM3 is associated with poor prognosis in patients with primary hepatocellular carcinoma

Tripartite motif-containing 3 (TRIM3) is a member of the tripartite motif (TRIM) protein family and is reported to be involved in the pathogenesis of various cancers. The role of TRIM3 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is unknown; thus, the goal of this study was to explore the expression level and prognostic value of TRIM3 in HCC. The expression level of TRIM3 in HCC surgically resected tumors and corresponding nontumorous samples was detected by real-time quantitative RT-PCR, Western blotting, and immunohistochemistry. The correlation between TRIM3 expression level and the clinicopathological features and prognosis of HCC patients was also analyzed. We observed that TRIM3 expression was remarkably decreased in tumor tissue samples from HCC patients, relative to matched nontumorous tissue samples, at the mRNA (p = 0.018) and protein level (p = 0.02). Similarly, immunohistochemical analysis showed that 53.4 % of samples had low TRIM3 protein expression. Clinicopathological analysis revealed that low TRIM3 expression was significantly correlated with tumor size (p = 0.034), histological grade (p < 0.001), serum AFP (p = 0.025), and TNM stage (p = 0.021). Furthermore, Kaplan–Meier survival analysis revealed that low TRIM3 expression was associated with poor survival in HCC patients. Finally, our multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that TRIM3 expression was an independent prognostic factor for overall survival of HCC patients. In conclusion, this study suggests that TRIM3 may play a significant role in HCC progression and acts as a valuable prognostic marker and potential therapeutic target for HCC.