HCV, HBV, HCC, NASH

The incidence rate of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is rising. It is one of the most common cancers worldwide and accounts for substantial morbidity and mortality. Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) are the most important etiologies of HCC, and effective screening and management strategies are crucial to reduce the HCC risk. For HBV, which accounts for the majority of HCC cases, most infections were acquired via perinatal and early horizontal transmission...

Host antitumor immune responses may be different between hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) caused by metabolic disorders and HCC associated with hepatitis virus infection. In this study, we examined the immune response of tumor-associated antigen (TAA)-specific T cells and immune cell profile in HCC patients separated by cause. Thirty two patients with HBV-related HCC, 42 patients with HCV-related HCC, and 18 patients with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH)-related HCC were analyzed. The frequencies of TAA-specific T cells, the expression levels of surface markers on each immune cell and the expression of each TAA in HCC tissue were measured...

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the leading causes of death globally. In Malaysia liver cancer is the eighth most common cause of cancer for both gender and fifth most common cause of cancer for males. Liver cancer is a cause of premature death in Malaysia: The trend from 1990 to 2010 was observed upward. Since 1990, the annual years of life lost (YLLs) from liver cancer have increased by 31.5%. Older persons are at higher risk and there is male predominance observed. Curative surgical resection, liver transplantation, and supportive symptomatic care, including percutaneous ethanol injection and radiofrequency ablation (RFA), and noncurative transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) are among available treatment facilities...

BACKGROUND & AIMS: Direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) have dramatically improved the outcome of patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection including those with decompensated cirrhosis (DC). We analyzed the evolution of indications and results of liver transplantation (LT) in the past 10 years in Europe, focusing on the changes induced by the advent of DAAs. METHODS: This is a cohort study based on data from the European Liver Transplant Registry (ELTR). Data of adult LTs performed between January 2007 to June 2017 for HCV, hepatitis B virus (HBV), alcohol (EtOH) and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) were analyzed...

Spleen tyrosine kinase (SYK) plays a critical role in immune cell signaling pathways and has been reported as a novel biomarker for human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). We sought to investigate the mechanism by which SYK promotes liver fibrosis and to evaluate SYK as a therapeutic target for liver fibrosis. We evaluated the cellular localization of SYK and the association between SYK expression and liver fibrogenesis in normal, hepatitis B virus (HBV)-infected, hepatitis C virus (HCV)-infected and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) liver tissue (n=36, 127, 22 and 30, respectively)...

Background A potential correlation between sex hormones, such as androgens and estrogens, and the development and progression of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been proposed. However, its details, in particular, aromatase status in diseased human liver has remained largely unknown. Materials and methods We immunolocalized aromatase, 17β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase (17β-HSD) type 1 and 17β-HSD type 2 in a total of 155 cases, consisting of normal liver (n = 10), nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) (n = 18), primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) (n = 6), primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) (n = 13), biliary atresia (n = 18), alcoholic hepatitis (n = 11), hepatitis C virus (HCV) (n = 31), HCV sustained virologic response (HCV-SVR) (n = 10), hepatitis B virus (HBV) (n = 20), HBV sustained virologic response (HBV-SVR) (n = 8) and infants (n = 10)...

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the fifth most common malignancy and the third leading cause of cancerrelated mortality worldwide. Risk factors for this malignancy include liver cirrhosis, HBV or HCV infection, fatty liver disease. THE AIM OF STUDY: This study aims to assess the occurrence and clinical characteristics of HCC in the Northeastern Poland between 2011 and 2015. The number of primary lesions, their size and location within the liver were analysed. The risk factors for this cancer in studied population have been identified...

BACKGROUND: Although hepatic resection is a potentially curative treatment for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), post-operative prognosis remains unsatisfactory due to the high incidence of recurrence. Several clinicopathological markers have been associated with HCC recurrence, but none has been validated. Extratumoral expression of cytochrome P4501A2 (CYP1A2) was recently proposed as predictor of HCC recurrence. AIMS: To validate extratumoral CYP1A2 as predictor of HCC recurrence and to determine its applicability to pretreatment liver biopsy...

Direct-acting antiviral (DAA) therapy, recently approved for patients with decompensated cirrhosis (DC) secondary to hepatitis C virus (HCV), is associated with improved hepatic function. We analyzed trends in liver transplant (LT) wait-listing (WL) to explore potential impact of effective medical therapy on WL registration. This is a cohort study using the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients database from 2003 to 2015. A total of 47,591 adults wait-listed for LT from HCV, hepatitis B virus (HBV), and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) were identified...

Receiving Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD) exception status for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) improves wait-list survival and probability of liver transplantation (LT). We aim to evaluate etiology-specific disparities in MELD exception, LT wait-list times, and post-LT outcomes among patients with HCC listed for LT. Using United Network for Organ Sharing 2004-2013 data, we evaluated adults (age > 18 years) with HCC secondary to hepatitis C virus (HCV), nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), alcoholic cirrhosis (EtOH), hepatitis B virus (HBV), combined EtOH/HCV, and combined HBV/HCV...

BACKGROUND: The last Italian prevalence survey on chronic liver diseases (CLD) was performed in 2001. The present study evaluated the changes occurring over thirteen years. METHODS: We enrolled 2,557 CLD consecutive patients in 16 Italian liver units in 2014. RESULTS: HBV etiology accounted for 513 (20.2%) cases, alone in 439 and associated with HCV and/or alcohol abuse in 74. Of these 513, 11.9% were anti-HDV-positive and 7.2% HBeAg-positive...

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to evaluate any association between a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in the patatin-like phospholipase domain containing 3 (PNPLA3) (rs738409, C>G) and the development and prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). MATERIALS AND METHODS: Two hundred heathy controls and 388 HCC cases were included: 211 with HBV, 98 patients with HCV, 29 with alcoholic steatohepatitis (ASH) and 52 with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH)...

Hepatocellular carcinoma is a major problem in Asia because of the presence of multiple risk factors in the region such as endemicity of hepatitis B and significant contamination of foodstuff by aflatoxin in some areas. Another risk factor for HCC, chronic hepatitis C infection, in Asia is most significant in Japan, the only Asian country with more HCV than HBV-related hepatocellular carcinoma. As these risk factors can and are being modified by measures such as universal hepatitis B immunisation, successful treatment of HCV infections, reduction and improved surveillance of aflatoxin contamination of foodstuff, it is not surprising that the epidemiology of HCC in Asia is changing...

The present study investigated the clinicopathological characteristics of resected hepatitis B virus surface antigen (HBs-Ag)-negative, hepatitis C virus antibody (HCV-Ab)-negative hepatocellular carcinoma (NBNC HCC). The clinicopathological characteristics of 164 patients with NBNC HCC, 144 patients with HBs-Ag-positive HCC (HBV group) and 550 patients with HCV-Ab-positive HCC (HCV group) were compared. In the NBCN HCC group, 61 patients succumbed after 2 years. Subsequently, NBCN HCC patients were compared according to survival time (<2 years, 39 patients vs...

BACKGROUND: Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is an established independent risk factor for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). T2DM is associated with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), which is a major cause of non-HBV and non-HCV-related HCC; nevertheless, it has been difficult to identify those patients with T2DM who have a high risk of developing HCC. The aim of this study was to identify genetic determinants that predispose T2DM patients to HCC by genotyping T2DM susceptibility loci and PNPLA3...

BACKGROUND: Higher rates of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) recurrence after liver transplantation (LT) in patients with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection have been reported. This can influence their selection for LT and post-LT monitoring. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this work was to compare the rates of post-LT HCC recurrence and survival in HBV and non-HBV patients with the use of the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) database. METHODS: After accessing the UNOS database, we analyzed patients with HCC stage T2 who underwent LT from cadaveric donors on or after August 24, 1998...

Persistent hepatic inflammation resulting from hepatitis B or C virus infections (HBV or HCV, respectively), obesity-associated non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) or alcohol abuse is a hallmark feature of chronic liver diseases and appears to be an essential prerequisite of hepatocarcinogenesis. The inflammatory processes in the liver are regulated by various chemokines, which orchestrate the interaction between parenchymal liver cells, Kupffer cells (resident macrophages), hepatic stellate cells (HSC), endothelial cells, and infiltrating immune cells...

BACKGROUND: Non-alcoholic steatoheaptitis (NASH), the critical stage of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), is of chronic progression and can develop cirrhosis even hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, non-invasive biomarkers for NASH diagnosis remain poorly applied in clinical practice. Our study aims at testing the accuracy of the combination of cytokeratin-18 M30 fragment (CK-18-M30), fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF-21), interleukin 1 receptor antagonist (IL-1Ra), pigment epithelium-derived factor (PEDF) and osteoprotegerin (OPG) in diagnosing NAFLD and NASH...

miR-122, a completely conserved liver-specific miRNA in vertebrates, is essential for the maintenance of liver homeostasis. This 22 nucleotide RNA regulates diverse functions such as cholesterol, glucose and iron homeostasis, lipid metabolism and infection of hepatitis C virus (HCV) and of the parasitic protozoa, Leishmania donovani. It is the first miRNA that underwent successful clinical trials in HCV infected patients. In contrast, miR-122 expression is reduced in nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) patients, and in a subset of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients including hepatitis B virus (HBV) positive patients with highly invasive and metastatic cancer...

Hepatocarcinogenesis is a multistep process involving different genetic alterations that ultimately lead to malignant transformation of the hepatocyte. The liver is one of the main targets for different metastatic foci, but it represents an important and frequent locus of degeneration in the course of chronic disease. In fact, Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) represents the outcome of the natural history of chronic liver diseases, from the condition of fibrosis, to cirrhosis and finally to cancer. HCC is the sixth most common cancer in the world, some 630,000 new cases being diagnosed each year...