Taipei, 20 feb ( EFE).- A group of researchers Taiwanese today announced the discovery of a new model to predict the chances that a patient with hepatitis C develop liver cancer.
The model contemplates the age of the patient, their indexes ALT and AST of liver function, the virus RNA in the blood, cirrhosis, and genotype of the virus, explained the team director Chen Chien-jen, Vice President of the Academia Sinica of the island.
The model can predict the appearance of cancer with an accuracy of 80%, he added Chen,
Hepatitis B and C viruses are the main causes of liver cancer in Taiwan, where hepatitis B produces 20 to 25% of cases and the C, 70-75%.
Three of the 23 million inhabitants of Taiwan are carriers of the virus of hepatitis B and about 360,000 of the virus of hepatitis C, according to data from the Department of health on the island.
The same tennis team presented a new method to diagnose hepatitis B and its control, through the extent of the HBsAg Antigen, which are proteins produced by the virus of hepatitis B.
With these discoveries the Taiwanese researchers hope to detect earlier both the emergence of hepatitis as the odds that results in liver cancer. EFE
