Value of chromogranin A as a prognostic marker in cirrhotic patients with HCC before and after radiofrequency.

Abstract

Hepatocellular cancer (HCC) has turn out to be the 2nd

commanding trigger of malignancy mortality globally.

Assessment of serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) level is a valuable and widely utilized marker for the detection and monitoring of HCC, the overall AFP performance has been inadequate in terms of its poor sensitivity and specificity.

Hence, novel markers that complement the drawbacks of AFP are crucial to for screening and more precise diagnosis of HCC. One of these studied biomarkers is Chromogranin-A (CgA). Therefore, the aim of this study was to highlight the value of determination of CgA serum levels in monitoring patients with cirrhosis for early detection of HCC and its significance as a prognostic marker in patients with very early/early stage of HCC before and after radiofrequency.

The current study was carried out on 60 subjects who attended to Gastroentrology clinics at Kafr El-sheikh General Hospital and Ain Shams University clinics during the period from August 2018 till December 2019 they were divided as 30 cirrhotic patients with very early/early stage of HCC and diagnosed by triphasic CT, cirrhotic patients without HCC, and 15 healthy subjects as control group.

As regard HCC markers, results revealed that both markers (AFP and Cg-A) were significantly higher in HCC patients compared to healthy controls, as expected. Moreover, the median levels of both markers were significantly elevated in HCC patients when compared to their levels in cirrhotic patients.