Abstract: Objective To explore the relationship between runtrelated transcription factor 3（RUNX3） gene promoter methylation and clinicopathological features of hepatocellular carcinoma（HCC）. Methods All eligible related studies published up to January 2013 were searched out from MEDLINE， Cochrane Library Database， EMBASE， CINAHL， Web of Science， Chinese Biomedical Database（CBM）， Wanfang and CNKI databases according to the retrieval strategy of Cochrance network. Two reviewers independently identified the literatures according to inclusion and exclusion criteria. Metaanalysis was performed using STATA 120 software to calculate crude odds ratio（OR） with their 95％ confidence interval（95％CI）.
Results A total of 8 studies comprising 598 subjects（513 carcinoma tissues， 429 paracarcinoma tissues and 85 normal liver tissues） were finally included. The included studies showed good homogeneity in the models of carcinoma tissue vs. paracarcinoma tissue， carcinoma tissue vs. normal tissue， para-carcinoma tissue vs. normal tissue， TNM stage， histological grade and invasion level. Overall， the findings demonstrated that the frequency of RUNX3 promoter methylation in carcinoma tissues was significantly higher than those of paracarcinoma and normal tissues （carcinoma tissue vs. para-carcinoma tissue： OR=20.81， 95％CI：13.0031.15， P＜0.001； carcinoma tissue vs. normal tissue： OR=19.33， 95％CI： 13.54-27.62， P＜0.001； para-carcinoma tissue vs. normal tissue： OR=1.01， 95％CI：0.36-2.85， P=0.981）. In carcinoma tissues， the frequency of RUNX3 promoter methylation was related with TNM stage， histological grade and invasion level. The frequencies of RUNX3 promoter methylation were higher in satge ⅢⅣ versus satge Ⅰ-Ⅱ， grade 3-4 versus grade 1-2 and grade T3-T4 versus grade T1-T2 （TNM stage： OR=1.17， 95％CI： 1.01-1.87， P=0.048； histological grade： OR=1.48， 95％CI： 1.04-1.82， P=0.025； invasion level： OR=1.07， 95％CI： 1.00-1.72， P=0.049）. Conclusion The RUNX3 gene promoter is hypermethylated in HCC， which indicating its relationship with the occurrence and progress of HCC.