During its early development, liver cancer may cause no signs or symptoms. Even when there are symptoms, they are fairly discreet, and can usually go unnoticed for a long period of time. In most cases, the cancer is discovered incidentally during an examination done for another medical condition or during regular check up to monitor a cirrhosis.
When symptoms finally emerge, liver cancer tends to cause pain in the upper right of the abdomen and sometimes presence of a palpable mass in the abdomen, just below the rib cage. As the disease worsens, the following symptoms can occur:
- fever
- nausea
- weakness
- difficulty breathing
- loss of appetite
- bloating
- chronic fatigue
- dark urine
- gray stool
- abnormal weight loss
- yellowing of the skin and whites of the eyes.