Syndecan-1 in Liver Diseases

Liver diseases such as liver cirrhosis, primary and metastatic liver cancers are still a major medical challenge. Syndecan-1 is one of the most important proteoglycans in the liver. Syndecan-1 is normally expressed on the surfaces of hepatocytes and cholangiocytes. Due to liver diseases the amount of syndecan-1 increases in the liver. Despite the emerging data of the biological function of syndecan-1, the clinical usefulness of this proteoglycan is still unknown. In our study we correlated syndecan-1 expression to clinico-pathological data. We found that syndecan-1 proved to be a good marker for hepatitis C virus based hepatocellular carcinoma and increased with liver dysfunction.