MicroRNA-30e and MicroRNA-223 Expression for Early Diagnosis of Hepatocellular Carcinoma Associated with Hepatitis C Virus: submitted: Oct 22, 2019; Accepted: Jan 9, 2020; Published online: Jan 25, 2020

Background. The goals of this study were to elucidate the use of the expression of microRNA-30e (miR-30e) and microRNA-223 (miR-223) as diagnostic biomarkers for early diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) associated with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. Methods. The study included three groups, the first group included thirty patients with HCC associated with HCV, the second group included thirty patients with cirrhosis with HCV and the third group included thirty healthy control subjects. Blood samples were obtained for determination of serum expression of miR-30e and miR-223 by real time polymerase chain reaction. Results. There was significant decrease of miR-30e of expression in patients with HCC (0.16 ± 0.1) compared to both patients with cirrhosis (0.4 ± 0.2, P<0.01) and healthy control subjects (1.2 ± 0.4, P<0.001). There was also significant reduction of miR-223 expression levels in patients with HCC (0.2 ± 0.1) compared to patients with cirrhosis (0.5 ± 0.2, P<0.01) and healthy control subjects (1.0 ± 0.1, P<0.001). There was also significant decrease of miR-30e expression in late stage versus early stage of HCC (0.1 ± 0.0 vs. 0.22 ± 0.1, P<0.001), while there was no significant difference of alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) between patients with late and early HCC. Also, values of miR-223 had significantly reduced levels in late HCC compared to its expression values in early HCC (0.1± 0.0 vs. 0.23 ± 0.2, P<001). Conclusion. There was significant reduction of expression of miR-30e and miR-223 in serum of HCC patients compared to either patients with cirrhosis or healthy subjects. These results show that the combined use of both biomarkers had better sensitivity in the diagnosis of HCC compared to AFP