AFP and Cirrhosis: Our results suggested that the TRIM4 level was associated with vascular invasion (p=0.029), tumour capsule (p<0.01) and HKLC stage (p=0.034); however, no significant associations were detected between TRIM4 expression and age, sex, tumour size, hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, tumour number, cirrhosis, grade of tumour differentiation or serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) concentration (Table 1).