ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study is to investigate aberrant methylation of p16INK4a in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). We determined the methylation status of CpG island of p16INK4a in 29 HCC and corresponding normal liver tissues by methylation specific-PCR method. Aberrant methylation status was detected in 41.4% of tumors and 6.9% of corresponding normal liver tissues. No significant correlations between methylation status and clinico-pathological data were found. In addition, survival analysis by multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that aberrant methylation status of p16INK4a was not an independent prognostic factor for poor survival among HCC patients. Our findings demonstrated that methylation of p16INK4a were detectable in HCC tissues of Thai patients and suggested that hypermethylation of p16INK4a may contribute to the hepatocellular carcinogenesis.