LncRNA MALAT1 serves as a risk factor in perioperative respiratory adverse events in children under general anesthesia

The perioperative respiratory adverse events (PRAE) are ineluctable during pediatric anesthesia. Accurate assessment of preoperative anesthesia is significant to reduce surgical risks in general anesthesia. This study focused on the expression level and predictive performance of lncRNA MALAT1 in PRAE for general anesthesia children. 236 medical records from children patients were included and they were divided into the No-PRAE group (<i>n</i> = 129) and the PRAE group (<i>n</i> = 107). Blood samples obtained before general anesthesia were used to evaluate the relative levels of MALAT1 by qRT-PCR. The multivariate logistic regression analysis was carried out to identify underlying risk factors. The receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curve was plotted to estimate the diagnostic performance of MALAT1 in the occurrence of PRAE. The serum MALAT1 in the PRAE group was identified to be higher than that in the No-PRAE group. The regression analysis indicated that patients with preoperative airway disease (OR: 2.813; 95%CI: 1.327-5.961) or longer anesthesia duration (OR: 2.131; 95%CI: 1.111-4.088) or higher levels of MALAT1 (OR: 13.019; 95%CI: 6.769-25.039) faced a higher risk of PRAE. The area under the ROC curve was 0.885 while the sensitivity and specificity were 79.44% and 82.17%, respectively, identifying the referrible value of MALAT1 as a risk factor for predicting PRAE in general anesthesia children. In conclusion, the increased MALAT1 was a potential indicator of predicting PRAE in general anesthesia children.