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Glypican-3 expression is correlated with poor prognosis in hepatocellular carcinoma

  1. Hirofumi Shirakawa1,3,
  2. Hitomi Suzuki1,
  3. Manami Shimomura1,
  4. Motohiro Kojima2,
  5. Naoto Gotohda3,
  6. Shinichiro Takahashi3,
  7. Toshio Nakagohri3,
  8. Masaru Konishi3,
  9. Nobuaki Kobayashi4,
  10. Taira Kinoshita3,
  11. Tetsuya Nakatsura1,*

Article first published online: 4 MAY 2009

DOI: 10.1111/j.1349-7006.2009.01206.x

Issue

Cancer Science

Cancer Science

Volume 100, Issue 8, pages 1403–1407, August 2009

Additional Information

How to Cite

Shirakawa, H., Suzuki, H., Shimomura, M., Kojima, M., Gotohda, N., Takahashi, S., Nakagohri, T., Konishi, M., Kobayashi, N., Kinoshita, T. and Nakatsura, T. (2009), Glypican-3 expression is correlated with poor prognosis in hepatocellular carcinoma. Cancer Science, 100: 1403–1407. doi: 10.1111/j.1349-7006.2009.01206.x

Author Information

  1. 1

    Section for Cancer Immunotherapy, Investigative Treatment Division

  2. 2

    Pathology Division, Research Center for Innovative Oncology

  3. 3

    Hepato-Biliary pancreatic Surgery division, National Cancer Center Hospital East, Chiba

  4. 4

    Department of Organ Regulatory Surgery, Ehime University Graduate School of Medicine, Ehime, Japan

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: tnakatsu@east.ncc.go.jp

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 10 JUL 2009
  2. Article first published online: 4 MAY 2009
  3. (Received November 21, 2008/Revised April 10, 2009/Accepted April 19, 2009/Online publication June 2, 2009)

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The relationship between overexpression of glypican (GPC)-3 that is specific for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and the prognosis has not yet been clarified. We attempted to determine the expression profile of GPC3 in association with the clinicopathological factors by immunohistochemical analysis in HCC patients and investigated the potential prognostic value of GPC3 by comparing the survival rate between the GPC3-positive and GPC3-negative HCC patients. Primary HCC tissue samples (n = 107) obtained from patients who had undergone hepatectomy between 2000 and 2001 were analyzed. GPC3 expression was less frequently observed in well-differentiated HCC than in moderately and poorly differentiated HCC, the difference in the frequency being statistically significant. GPC3-positive HCC patients had a significantly lower 5-year survival rate than the GPC3-negative HCC patients (54.5 vs 87.7%, P = 0.031). Among 80 of the 107 (74.6%) patients with initial treatment who underwent hepatectomy, none of GPC3-negative HCC patients (n = 16, 20.0%) died during the follow-up period. No deaths were noted in the GPC3-negative HCC patients among the 71 (88.7%) patients with moderately and poorly differentiated HCC. Multivariate analysis identified GPC3 expression (P = 0.034) as an independent prognostic factor for the overall survival. We showed that GPC3 expression is correlated with a poor prognosis in HCC patients. (Cancer Sci 2009)

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