Morphologic and Immunologic Characteristics of Hepatocellular Carcinoma for Prognosis of Surgical Intervention

Hepatocellular carcinoma is the predominant malignancy in patients with cirrhosis and chronic liver disease. Our aim was to assess the morphologic, radiologic, and immunologic charac teristics of hepatocellular carcinoma and liver cirrhosis concerning surgical treatment tactics.

We performed a cross-sectional analysis of a prospective study performed at the JSC National Scientific Center of Surgery (named after A. Syzganov). The study included 58 patients: 31 with hepatocellular carcinoma (53.4%) and 27 with chronic liver disease (46.6%). The average age of patients was 55.6 ± 1.7 years.

Patients were tested for hepatitis B virus and hepatitis C virus infection. Patients with elevated levels of alfa-fetoprotein, alanine aminotransferase, and total bilirubin were detected. Morphologic signs of hepatocellular carcinoma with a predominance of a trabecular type rather than a solid type of tumor were found. Patients with hepatocellular carcinoma underwent surgical liver resection and transarterial chemoembolization before living-donor liver transplant. One-year survival rate of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma was 93.5%.

The diagnosis and surgical options for hepatocellular carcinoma should be studied, taking into account the expanded laboratory characteristics of cancer.