Pretreatment serum C-reactive protein level predicts poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma

C-reactive protein (CRP) is known to be associated with poor prognosis in patients with various malignancies. We investigated the relationship between the pretreatment serum CRP level and survival in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in various stages of the disease. A cohort of 133 patients with newly diagnosed HCC was prospectively evaluated. The patients were divided into two groups: high-CRP group ( n = 27) with the pretreatment serum CRP level ≧ 1.0 mg/dl and low-CRP group ( n = 106) with the CRP level