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Updated: Jun 17, 2026
Detection of Low Copy Number Integrated Viral DNA Formed by In Vitro Hepatitis B Infection
Published on: November 7, 2018
Low Tumor miR-369-3p Levels Combined with Plasma Hepatitis B Virus Pre-S2 Gene Deletion Mutation Predict Higher
Ya-Chi Wu1, Long-Bin Jeng2,3,4,5, Tsai-Chung Li6,7
1Department of Family Medicine, An Nan Hospital, China Medical University, Tainan, Taiwan.
Introduction:
Although resection surgery is a curative treatment for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), high HCC recurrence leads to poor patient survival. Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is an important risk factor for HCC. Deletion mutation in HBV pre-S2 gene results in expression of pre-S2 mutant oncoprotein and represents an independent prognostic biomarker for HCC recurrence. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small non-coding RNAs that play key roles in HBV-related HCC.
Methods:
This study aimed to identify the miRNAs whose expression levels in tumor tissues were correlated with pre-S2 gene deletion mutation and post-resection HCC recurrence and investigate their potential in combination with pre-S2 gene deletion mutation to predict HCC recurrence in a retrospective cohort of patients.
Results:
The results showed that the expression level of miR-369-3p was decreased in tumor tissues of patients with pre-S2 gene deletion mutation or HCC recurrence. miR-369-3p was identified as a prognostic biomarker for HCC recurrence. Patients with pre-S2 gene deletion mutation combined with a low level of miR-369-3p had a higher risk of HCC recurrence than patients with either one or none of these two biomarkers. The combination of pre-S2 gene deletion mutation and miR-369-3p expression level showed a greater prognostic potential for HCC recurrence than either biomarker alone.
Conclusion:
Collectively, miR-369-3p held exploratory promise in serving as a combination biomarker with pre-S2 gene deletion mutation to provide a better potential in predicting HBV-related HCC recurrence after curative surgical resection.
