The clinical significance of the
sodium-potassium ATPase regulator FXYD domain-containing ion transport regulator 3 (FXYD3) has been demonstrated in a number of types of
cancer. However, the role of this
protein in human
hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains to be elucidated. In the present study, 217 HCC tissue samples were analyzed to evaluate the expression and prognostic significance of FXYD3 in HCC. Reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction was used to analyze the
mRNA expression of FXYD3 in 80 primary HCC specimens and paired non-cancerous liver tissue samples, while western blotting was used to analyze the
protein expression level of FXYD3 in another 24 pairs. These analyses demonstrated that the expression level of FXYD3 was significantly increasedb at the
mRNA and
protein levels in HCC
tumor tissues compared with adjacent non-cancerous tissues. Immunohistochemical analysis of 137
paraffin-embedded HCC tissue samples indicated that the expression of FXYD3 was associated with HCC clinicopathological characteristics. Kaplan-Meier analysis demonstrated that patients with high FXYD3
protein expression (n=60) experienced significantly poorer overall survival time compared with patients with low FXYD3
protein expression (n=77) (P<0.001). Multivariate analysis demonstrated that FYXD3
protein expression level (hazard ratio, 2.137; 95% confidence interval, 1.224-3.732; P=0.008) was an independent prognostic factor in patients with HCC. Overall, the results indicated that FXYD3 expression levels were higher in HCC
tumor tissues than in adjacent non-cancerous tissues, and that the FXYD3
protein may serve as a prognostic marker for HCC.