Usefulness of plasma full-length glypican-3 as a predictive marker of hepatocellular carcinoma recurrence after radial surgery.

Usefulness of plasma full-length glypican-3 as a predictive marker of hepatocellular carcinoma recurrence after radial surgery. Oncol Lett. 2020 Apr;19(4):2657-2666 Authors: Miura M, Fujinami N, Shimizu Y, Mizuno S, Saito K, Suzuki T, Konishi M, Takahashi S, Gotohda N, Suto K, Yoshida T, Nakatsura T Abstract Predicting the risk of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) recurrence before treatment is necessary for developing subsequent treatment policies. Several tumor markers found in blood, such as alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) and protein induced by vitamin K absence or antagonist-II (PIVKA-II), are presently used to determine the occurrence and recurrence of HCC and to predict patient prognosis. However, these markers are insufficient for these purposes as certain patients have HCC recurrence despite exhibiting negative AFP and PIVKA-II. The present study identified glypican-3 (GPC3), an embryonal carcinoma antigen that is expressed specifically in HCC and is secreted into blood. Although the N-terminal domain of GPC3 in sera may be a potential prognostic factor for HCC, its biological role remains unclear. By contrast, full-length GPC3 (FL-GPC3) is reported to serve important roles in cell differentiation, proliferation and signaling events that cause HCC. Given the biological roles of FL-GPC3 in HCC progression, the present study evaluated its potential as a predictive marker of HCC recurrence. In the present study, a novel measurement system...
Source: Oncology Letters - Category: Cancer & Oncology Tags: Oncol Lett Source Type: research