[A clinical study of complements as a marker of a hepatocellular carcinoma]

Serum complement C3, C4, and C3 proactivator (C3PA) have been evaluated for their diagnostic power in detecting a hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in patients with liver cirrhosis (LC). It was found that serum complement levels were lower in LC patients than in HCC patients and that difference of the serum C4 and C3PA levels between LC patients and HCC patients were statistically significant. In addition, serum C3 PA levels were found to correlate significantly with the serum gamma-GTP levels in HCC patients. Thus, using the cutoff values of C4 and C3PA as the mean values for HCC patients, examination of serum complement levels enabled the detection of 38% of the HCC patients with low AFP levels. These findings suggest that the examination of the serum complements may be a useful a tool for the detection of HCCs in LC patients.