[Inspection of guidelines for hepatocellular carcinoma]

An evidence-based clinical guideline for diagnosing and treating hepatocellular carcinoma patients was published in 2005, based on 7,118 original English papers(published between 1966-2002)and edited by the executive members of the Liver Cancer Study Group of Japan (Chief Editor, Professor M. Makuuchi, MD). These were composed of 58 clinical questions which covered prevention, surveillance, diagnosis, surgery, transplantation, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, chemoembolization and ablation therapy. The surveys investigating the validity and usefulness of this guideline revealed that it is well worked out and considered useful by medical practitioners. This guideline changed the therapeutic strategy of 20% of the experts. However, 43% of experts and 30% of non experts believed that this guideline restricted their medical discretion. Moreover, the percentage of medical practitioners who felt that medical malpractice suits would increase exceeded those who did not. A revised 2009 version was published based on the evaluation of 2,950 original papers (published between 2002-2007). Major revisions were not made, but clinical questions and scientific statements were updated. However, this version of the guideline does not provide clear recommendations in about 40% of the clinical questions because of lack of evidence. The guideline must be utilized based on an appropriate understanding of medical science and medical practice, and not on dogmatism.