Hepatoblastoma: the prognostic significance of histologic type

The clinicopathologic features of 105 hepatoblastomas accessioned to the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology between 1967 and 1987 were reviewed. DNA content was analyzed by flow cytometry. A multivariate analysis using the Cox proportional hazards model was performed to evaluate the effect of stage, histologic type, and DNA content on the prognosis for survival. The relative risks of death for a given stage compared to the other stages combined were 0.1637, 0.5672, 2.8742, and 3.5148 for stages I-IV, respectively. The relative risk of death for a given histologic type adjusted for age, sex, and stage compared to the other types was 1.0739 (p = .8850) for the fetal pattern, 1.7409 (p = .1662) for the embryonal pattern, 0.5292 (p = .0754) for the mixed pattern, 1.1980 (p = .7729) for the macrotrabecular pattern, and 3.7096 (p = .1061) for the small-cell undifferentiated pattern. Of 19 hepatoblastomas analyzed for DNA content, 5 were DNA diploid and 11 were DNA aneuploid; 3 could not be classified. The stage of disease at presentation proved to be a significant prognostic factor, whereas histologic type and DNA content did not have a significant effect.