Attallah Kareem A, Farid Khaled, Albannan Mohamed S
Clinical Research Department, Damietta Directorate for Health Affairs, Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population, Damietta, Egypt.
Research and Development Department, Biotechnology Research Center, 23 July St., Industrial Zone, New Damietta, 34517, Egypt.
Med Oncol. 2025 Jun 19;42(7):274. doi: 10.1007/s12032-025-02834-x.
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is often associated with better treatment options for small asymptomatic tumors if HCC is caught early. A year ago, the "Technology in Cancer Research and Treatment" Journal published a report on the highly sensitive HCC-Check for the early diagnosis of HCC. Here, we examine and confirm the applicability of HCC-Check in 486 liver-diseased patients with earlier stages of HCC based on two widely used Cancer of the Liver Italian Program (CLIP) and Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer (BCLC) staging systems for the identification of small tumors. Our results showed that HCC-Check produced 0.90 AUC with 78.26% sensitivity and 83.89% specificity, when used to distinguish small HCCs from cirrhotic patients. Our findings showed that HCC-Check increased with disease progression according to the CLIP and BCLC systems, producing significant (p < 0.0001) Spearman correlation coefficients of 0.633 and 0.458, respectively. HCC-Check yielded 0.85 (0.78-0.92) AUC, 66.67% (47.19-82.71) sensitivity, and 83.89% (77.69-88.94) specificity for identifying CLIP (0-1) while producing 0.87 (0.79-0.94) AUC, 65% (40.78-84.61) sensitivity, and 83.89% (77.69-88.94) specificity for identifying BCLC A. Additionally, HCC-Check yielded 0.90 (0.83-0.97) AUC, 78.26% (56.30-92.54) sensitivity, and 83.89% (77.69-88.94) specificity for discriminating small tumors < 3 cm. Simplified HCC-Check still competes with HCC-Check, providing 0.89 (0.83-0.95) AUC with 73.91% (51.60-89.77) sensitivity and 82.51% (76.22-87.72) specificity for identifying small-sized HCC. All these results were superior to those obtained by AFP. In conclusion, the study findings support that HCC-Check and its simplified version could be a useful tool for early detection of HCC, aiding definitive treatment.
如果肝细胞癌（HCC）能早期发现，对于无症状小肿瘤通常有更好的治疗选择。一年前，《癌症研究与治疗技术》杂志发表了一篇关于用于HCC早期诊断的高灵敏度HCC-Check的报告。在此，我们基于两种广泛使用的意大利肝癌项目（CLIP）和巴塞罗那临床肝癌（BCLC）分期系统，对486例处于HCC早期阶段的肝病患者进行检查，以确认HCC-Check在识别小肿瘤方面的适用性。我们的结果显示，当用于区分小HCC与肝硬化患者时，HCC-Check的曲线下面积（AUC）为0.90，灵敏度为78.26%，特异性为83.89%。我们的研究结果表明，根据CLIP和BCLC系统，HCC-Check随着疾病进展而升高，Spearman相关系数分别为0.633和0.458，具有显著统计学意义（p < 0.0001）。对于识别CLIP（0 - 1）期，HCC-Check的AUC为0.85（0.78 - 0.92），灵敏度为66.67%（47.19 - 82.71），特异性为83.89%（77.69 - 88.94）；对于识别BCLC A期，AUC为0.87（0.79 - 0.94），灵敏度为65%（40.78 - 84.61），特异性为83.89%（77.69 - 88.94）。此外，对于鉴别直径<3 cm的小肿瘤，HCC-Check的AUC为0.90（0.83 - 0.97），灵敏度为78.26%（56.30 - 92.54），特异性为83.89%（77.69 - 88.94）。简化版HCC-Check与HCC-Check仍具有可比性，在识别小尺寸HCC方面，AUC为0.89（0.83 - 0.95），灵敏度为73.91%（51.60 - 89.77），特异性为82.51%（76.22 - 87.72）。所有这些结果均优于甲胎蛋白（AFP）检测结果。总之，研究结果支持HCC-Check及其简化版可作为早期检测HCC的有用工具，有助于确定治疗方案。
