Measurement of serum and tissue des-gamma-carboxyprothrombin in resectable hepatocellular carcinoma.
BACKGROUND
The total des-gamma-carboxyprothrombin (DCP) produced in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and the surrounding non-cancer liver tissue was estimated and the correlation between tissue DCP and serum DCP levels was examined.


METHODS
Forty patients with a single primary HCC nodule served as the subjects. The DCP was quantified by electrochemiluminescence immunoassay and the tissue volumes were estimated by computed tomography (CT).


RESULTS
The mean tissue DCP in the cancer tissue, non-cancer tissue and the whole HCC specimen was 147,400, 20,200 and 190,000 mAU, respectively, which correlated positively with the serum DCP level (r2 = 0.657, 0.452, and 0.684, respectively). The DCP expression levels in the cancer and non-cancer liver tissue were also confirmed by immunohistochemical detection of DCP.


CONCLUSIONS
The elevation of serum DCP levels in HCC patients is influenced by DCP production not only in the cancer tissue, but also in the surrounding non-cancer liver tissue.
Xiang
Can-Hong
CH
Hepato-Biliary-Pancreatic Surgery Division, Department of Surgery, Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8655, Japan.
Zhang
Wei
W
Inagaki
Yoshinori
Y
Zhang
Ke-Ming
KM
Nakano
Yasuhiro
Y
Kokudo
Norihiro
N
Sugawara
Yasuhiko
Y
Dong
Jia-Hong
JH
Nakata
Munehiro
M
Tang
Wei
W