Assessment of Lens Culinaris Agglutinin-Reactive Fraction of Alpha Fetoprotein as an Early Diagnostic Marker for Hepatocellular Carcinoma among Sudanese Patients with Chronic Liver Disease

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a common complication in patients with chronic viral hepatitis and liver cirrhosis. Detection of HCC at an early stage is critical for a favorable clinical outcome. This is a case-control, hospital-based study, aimed to determine the usefulness of Lens Culinaris Agglutinin-Reactive Fraction of Alpha Fetoprotein (AFP-L3) as an early diagnostic marker for HCC in Sudanese Patients with chronic liver diseases. Blood samples were collected from 25 patients with HCC, 32 patients with chronic liver diseases (cirrhosis and chronic HBV/HCV), and 30 healthy individuals as control. AFP-L3 and Total Alpha Fetoprotein (T.AFP) were measured by immunometric assay. AFP-L3 and T.AFP were elevated in all patients (chronic liver disease and HCC patients). Both markers were found to be elevated with the increase of tumor size, and with presence of focal liver lesion (being elevating with the increase of number of lesions).Both markers showed to be elevated until a year after onset of the disease, then, decreased by time. AFP-L3 and T.AFP were positively correlated with the increase of patient's age, but no significant difference was found between males and females in all types of patients. AFP-L3 is more specific for HCC, this encourage us to use AFP-L3 as adjunct marker for HCC diagnosis.