Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the sixth most
common cancer worldwide. The diagnosis of HCC is mainly based on a
combination of abdominal ultrasound and serum alpha fetoprotein
(AFP) level. Serum AFP has low sensitivity, serum Golgi protein 73
(sGP73) is a novel and promising biomarker for detection of
hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, there are few reports on the
predictive values levels of GP73 in diagnosis of HCC. We aimed to
evaluate the clinical usefulness of serum GP73 in the diagnosis of
HCC. Methods: The study was conducted on 80 patients included 20
patients with chronic hepatitis C (group I), 20 patients with liver
cirrhosis (group II divided into two subgroups of equal number
compensated and decompensated liver cirrhosis), 40 patients with HCC
(group III) in addition to 10 apparently healthy control subjects (group
IV). All patients in this study were subjected to full history taking,
thorough clinical examination, radiological investigations, routine
laboratory investigations and serum AFP in addition to serum GP73
assay by ELISA technique. Results: Assessment of the diagnostic
performance of serum GP73 and serum AFP in the present study in
diagnosis of HCC revealed that serum GP73 at cutoff of 11.1 ng/mL
showed a diagnostic sensitivity of 82.5%, specificity 70%, positive
predictive value 78.6%, negative predictive value 75% and the area
under the curve (AUC) was 0.8025, Regarding serum AFP at cutoff
320ng/mL showed the diagnostic sensitivity of 79.41%, specificity 60
%, PPV 65.9%%, NPV 75 %, AUC 0.766, This proved the superiority
of GP73 estimation over AFP assay in cases of HCC, Conclusion:
Serum GP73 had an overall performance better than AFP in detection
of HCC in patients with chronic HCV related liver disease so it can be
used in diagnosis of HCC. |
