Hepatitis B virus core-related antigen is a putative predictive marker of hepatocarcinogenesis for the patient with nucleos(t)ide analogues therapy

Serum HBcrAg concentration has been reported to be well correlated with intrahepatic covalently closed circular DNA (cccDNA) and a useful marker for monitoring the antiviral effect of lamivudine. We investigated a total of 24 HBeAg-negative patients who were treated with nucleos(t)ide analogues for more than 2 years (2.2-8.1 years). Eleven patients developed hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and the remaining patients did not. Serum HBcrAg concentration was significantly higher in the 11 patients with HCC than in the remaining patients without HCC (4.0±0.7 logIU/ml vs 3.2±0.4 logIU/ml) (p=0.002). The clinical and virological characteristics were not significantly different between two groups. Thus, the present study suggests that HBcrAg can be a useful predictor of HCC for HBeAg-negative patients who had complete virological response on nucleos(t)ide analogues therapy though further study may be needed.