Methods and kits for predicting the responsiveness of hepatocellular carcinoma patients to 5-fluorouracil-based combination chemotherapy

A method for identifying single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) of a target nucleic acid in a patient suffering from hepatocellular carcinoma for selecting a therapy for the patient, comprising,

• obtaining a nucleic acid-containing sample from the patient;
• detecting the presence of at least one SNP genotype in the target nucleic acid of the nucleic acid sample using a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) based method, wherein the at least one SNP genotype comprises a T/T genotype of rs9679162, and the PCR-based method comprises,
• using a first forward primer having the sequence of SEQ ID No:
• 1 and a first reverse primer having the sequence of SEQ ID No:
• 2 to amplify the nucleic acid-sample to give rise to a first amplicon,
• using a second forward primer having the sequence of SEQ ID No:
• 3 and a second reverse primer to amplify the first amplicon to give rise to a second amplicon,
• reacting the second amplicon with a first restriction enzyme that recognizes the sequence of GTCTC in the target nucleic acid to perform a first restriction digestion reaction to give rise to a first digestion product, and
• determining the presence of the T/T genotype of rs9679162 when the first digestion product consists essentially of non-digested fragment;
• and
• selecting a 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) based combination chemotherapy for the patient when the detection result indicates the presence of the at least one SNP genotype.