Comparison of clinicopathological features of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma seropositive for α-fetoprotein alone and those seropositive for des-γ-carboxy prothrombin alone

Background: There has been no comparative study of the clinicopathological features of HCC patients who are seropositive for alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) alone and those who are seropositive for des-gamma-carboxy prothrombin (DCP) alone. The authors, thus, performed this comparative study. Methods: The clinicopathological features of patients with solitary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), who underwent a hepatectomy were compared among the four below groups according to the seropositivity of AFP and DCP: group A, seronegative for both AFP below 20 ng/mL and DCP below 40 mAU/mL; group B, seropositive for AFP above 100 ng/mL and seronegative for DCP, group C, seronegative for AFP and seropositive for DCP above 100 mAU/mL. and group D, seropositive for both AFP and DCP. Results: Group B patients showed a higher incidence of HCC with an indistinct margin, and a somewhat higher incidence of small HCC less than 2 cm in greatest dimension compared with group C patients. By contrast, group C patients had a higher frequency of HCC with a distinct margin compared with that of an indistinct margin, large tumors more than 3 cm compared with that of small tumors less than 2 cm, and a somewhat higher frequency of moderately to poorly differentiated HCC compared with that of well-differentiated HCC. Our HCC cases showed advanced clinicopathological features in the order of group C, group B and group A. Groups C and D patients showed similar characteristics. Conclusions: Hepatocellular carcinoma patients who were seropositive for AFP alone demonstrated clinicopathological features of less advanced HCC compared with those who were seropositive for DCP alone. (C) 2001 Blackwell Science Asia Pty Ltd.