Is There Any Association Between Blood Groups & Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC): A Preliminary Study

Abstract

The study conducted on randomly selected 54 patients: 38 patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC); 16 patients with cirrhosis and 10 healthy volunteers during the period of December 2001 to June 2002. 10 ml blood from each patient and control were collected. Each sample was divided into two parts: 1) 2 ml freshly used blood on ethylene – diamine – tetracetic acid (EDTA) as a preservative for testing the following blood group antigens by agglutination technique: Major blood groups [ABO and RhD] and Minor blood groups [Rhd, MNSs, Duffy (Fy) and Lewis (Le)]. 2) The sera of the remaining blood samples (8 ml) were used to diagnose HCC patients: Two hepatitis markers: p53 autoantibodies (p53 Abs) and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). The results reveal that, no significant correlation is found between any of the studied blood group systems and HCC or cirrhosis. Also, no significant correlation is found between any of the studied blood group systems and VEGF and p53 markers except the significant correlation between M blood group and VEGF (p = 0.02).