A novel intrahepatic arterial chemotherapy after radical resection for advanced hepatocellular carcinoma

Advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) with portal vein invasion and/or intrahepatic metastasis has an unfavorable prognosis even after radical hepatic resection. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of a novel postoperative adjuvant chemotherapy given through the hepatic artery and based on biochemical modulation using cisplatin (CDDP) and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU).

Fifteen patients with advanced HCC with portal vein invasion into the main trunk and/or intrahepatic metastases of more than 3 segments were included in this study. After radical hepatic resection, the patients were divided to two groups: the adjuvant chemotherapy group (n=7) given the novel arterial infusion regimen with CDDP and 5-FU, and the control group (n=8) given no adjuvant chemotherapy.

Three-year survival rate of the adjuvant chemotherapy group tended to be significantly longer compared to that for the control group (p < 0.05). Most of the tumor recurrence was in the remnant liver, 5 cases in both of the groups. Significant difference of the recurrence patterns was recognized, rather than difference of the disease-free survival rate between the two groups. All of the intrahepatic recurrences are multiple in the control group, but in the adjuvant chemotherapy group, 2 cases of the recurrences showed a localized tumor surgically resected. It is noteworthy that the occurrence of multiple recurrence was significantly later in the adjuvant chemotherapy group compared to the control group (18.9 months vs. 6.5 months; p<0.05).

Our data suggest that this novel adjuvant chemotherapy can improve the postoperative prognosis of patients with the advanced HCC.