Published online May 28, 2015. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v7.i9.1282
Peer-review started: November 28, 2014
First decision: January 8, 2015
Revised: January 19, 2015
Accepted: March 16, 2015
Article in press: March 18, 2015
Published online: May 28, 2015
Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major risk factor for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The HBV mutations, which include point mutation, deletion, insertion and truncation mutation of HBV gene in 4 open reading frames (S, C, P, X), are closely associated with HCC pathogenesis. Some mutations accumulated during chronic HBV infection could be regarded as a biomarker to predict the occurrence of HCC. The detection of the mutations in clinical practice could be helpful for defining better preventive and therapeutic strategies and, moreover, predicting the progression of liver disease.
Core tip: This mini review fully describes the relationship between hepatitis B virus (HBV) genome mutations in different regions with liver disease progression and development to hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) according to the recent data of mutations in chronic hepatitis B patients. Accordingly, the HBV mutations, either in the preS or PreC or/and core promoter region, are significantly associated with HCC and could be regarded as a biomarker to predict the occurrence of HCC.