Expression of PTEN and TIMP-3 in hepatocellular carcinoma and its clinical significance

Objective To investigate the expression of PTEN and TIMP-3 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and its clinical significance. Methods Expression of PTEN and TIMP-3 mRNA and protein in tumor and adjacent tissue of 30 HCC cases and 10 cases of normal liver tissue was detected by qRT-PCR, Western blot and immunohistochemical SP method, respectively. The correlation between expression of PTEN and TIMP-3 and clinicopathologic features in HCC was analyzed. Results The expression of PTEN and TIMP-3 mRNA and protein in tumor and adjacent tissue of HCC was significantly lower than that in the normal liver tissue (P0.01), especially in tumor tissue (P0.01). The expression of PTEN and TIMP-3 protein was related to the metastasis of HCC, tumor differentiation, serum alpha-fetoprotein level (AFP≥400 μg/L) and TNM staging (P0.01 or 0.05), but unrelated to the tumor size and hepatocirrhosis (P0.05). Conclusion There is a downexpression of PTEN and TIMP-3 in HCC. The expression PTEN and TIMP-3 may be helpful for evaluating the invasiveness, metastasis, clinical staging and extrahepatic metastasis of HCC.