Because hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a complex disease with multiple risk pathogenic
mechanisms due to misdiagnosis with a single biomarker. A combination of biomarkers may be
more valuable for the diagnosis, staging and prognosis of HCC. In the near future, identifying
non-invasive and cost-effective biomarkers for early diagnosis and personalized treatment of
HCC will be one of the most promising fields of biomarker research. This study assessed the alpha
L fucosidase (AFU) value as a prognostic biomarker in patients with HCC before and after
chemo-embolization and radio-frequency. A total of 60 subjects were subdivided into 3 groups:
GI: 30 HCC patients underwent interventional management (chemo-embolization or radiofrequency),
GII: 20 liver cirrhosis (LC) patients and GIII: 10 cross-matched individuals as control
The results showed that plasma AFU had significantly higher diagnostic performance in HCC
diagnosis than alpha fetoprotein (AFP) at a cut off value of > 2.5u/l, with sensitivity 100%, specificity
95%, positive predictive value (PPV) 96.8%, negative predictive value (NPV) 100% and
diagnostic accuracy 98%. Basal pre-intervention AFU) had significantly high diagnostic performance
to predict HCC recurrence after intervention at a cut off value of > 12.5u/l with sensitivity
100%, specificity 92%, PPV, 71.4%, NPV 100% and diagnostic accuracy 93.3%. Postintervention
AFU had significant moderate diagnostic performance in predicting recurrence of
HCC at cut off value of > 7.5u/l with sensitivity 80%, specificity 92%, positive predictive value
(PPV) 66.7%, negative predictive value (NPV) 95.8% & diagnostic accuracy 90%.