Current data in clinicopathological characteristics of primary hepatic tumors

The present study aimed to investigate the status of primary liver tumors diagnosed in the Emergency Hospital of Mures County, Romania.

We performed a retrospective study based on data collected from histopathological bulletins stored in the archives of the Pathology Laboratories of Mures County. We selected those patients' data that were diagnosed with liver tumors during January 2004-August 2011. The acquired data were collected and processed statistically using the GraphPad InStat Demo 3 statistical software.

We identified 748 liver tumors out of which 264 were primary liver tumors (35.29%), whereof 108 were malignant primary liver tumors and 156 benign liver tumors. The male:female ratio in case of malignant tumors was 1.7:1 and for benign tumors it was 1:2.62. In case of malignant tumors, the mean age of male patients was 63.98±11.67 as for female patients it was 60.14±11.65 years. In case of benign tumors, the mean age of male patients was 59.29±9.58 as for female patients it was 55.55±12.86. 81.48% of the malignant tumors were hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), followed by cholangiocarcinoma (14.81%). 40% of HCC presented associated cirrhosis, in the other 60% signs of chronic alcoholism being observed.

Hepatocellular carcinoma remains the first on the list of malignant primary liver tumors in Romanian patients, probably due to a high rate of alcohol consumption.