According to a study appearing in the May issue of Hepatology, the journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, certain factors can be used to determine one's risk of developing hepatocellular carcinomas (HCC), otherwise known as liver cancer.
One major risk factor is a family history of liver cancer, but more of a surprise is that the study shows a 70-fold elevated risk of developing hepatocellular carcinoma in people with a family history of the disease as well as markers for either hepatitis B or hepatitis C.
Researchers from two Italian universities carried out a case-control study of 229 cases of HCC.
"Our findings confirm that individuals with a positive family history of liver cancer have three times higher risk of developing HCC," said Professor Carlo La Vecchia, one of the study's co-authors. "Monitoring individuals with family history, particularly those with hepatitis markers, could help to identify HCC at an earlier stage, and hence potentially reduce mortality from HCC."
Liver cancers is the sixth most commonly diagnosed cancer worldwide, the third most common cause of death worldwide, and responsible for as many as 700,000 deaths annually, according to statistics from the World Health Organization.
Source: Medical News Today
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