title: Hepatitis C virus infection is associated with the development of hepatocellular carcinoma.
abstract: A possible causative role for the recently discovered hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the development of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) was investigated by assay of sera from HCC patients in Japan for antibodies to a recombinant HCV antigen and to hepatitis B virus (HBV) antigens. Among the 253 HCC patients examined, 156 (61.7%) had no serum markers of either a previous or a current HBV infection (group I), 46 (18.2%) were negative for HBV surface antigen but positive for anti-HBV surface and/or anti-HBV core antibody, indicating the occurrence of a previous, transient HBV infection (group II), and 51 (20.2%) were chronically infected HBV carriers as evidenced by positivity for HBV surface antigen (group III). The prevalence of HCV antibody in group I (68.6%) and II (58.7%) patients was significantly higher than for group III (3.9%) or in 148 additional patients with other (non-HCC) cancers (10.1%) (P less than 0.01). Thus, there appears to be a strong association between HCV infection and the development of HCC, particularly in patients for which HBV infection cannot be implicated as a causative factor. The data also suggest an additional mode of transmission for HCV other than blood transfusion, since a history of blood transfusion was shown in only about 30% of the HCV antibody-positive HCC patients in groups I and II. A high prevalence of HCV antibody was also shown among patients with HCC whose disease was originally thought to be due to very high ethanol consumption.
authors.affiliation: Department of Enteroviruses, National Institute of Health, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Saito
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Miyamura
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ohbayashi
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Harada
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Katayama
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kikuchi
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Watanabe
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Koi
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Onji
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ohta
mesh_terms: D001803:Blood Transfusion; D006528:Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / Q000150:complications*; D005260:Female; D006509:Hepatitis B / Q000175:diagnosis; D006510:Hepatitis B Antibodies / Q000032:analysis; D006514:Hepatitis B Surface Antigens / Q000032:analysis; D006526:Hepatitis C / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis; D006525:Hepatitis, Viral, Human / Q000150:complications*; D006801:Humans; D008113:Liver Neoplasms / Q000150:complications*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged
chemical_list: D006510:Hepatitis B Antibodies; D006514:Hepatitis B Surface Antigens