Clinical Outcomes of DEB-TACE in Hepatic Metastatic Neuroendocrine Tumors: A 5-Year Single-Institutional Experience

To evaluate single-institution outcomes of drug-eluting bead transarterial chemoembolization (DEB-TACE) in the treatment of locally advanced neuroendocrine tumor (NET) hepatic metastases with a focus on safety and efficacy of treatment.

A single-center retrospective cohort study of the outcomes of consecutive patients with NELM who underwent DEB-TACE between 2014 and 2019 was performed. Clinicopathologic characteristics, radiologic response (modified Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors) at 1-month follow-up, adverse events, progression-free survival (PFS), and overall survival were calculated.

Among 287 patients (mean age of 62 years; 39% male: 61% female), disease burden was bilobar (90.2%) with mean largest tumor diameter measuring 4.9 ± 2.8 cm. Of these patients, 14.6% had no evidence of tumor in other organs or lymph nodes. Complete response occurred in 60 (20.9%) patients while 133 (46.3%) had partial responses. Major complication occurred in 2.4%. Liver function tests including total bilirubin and AST were overall stable at the 1-month follow-up, with only a small increase in the ALT at +8.9% (p < 0.01). Overall survival was 80.1% at 1 year, 49.1% at 3 years, and 12.3% at 5 years with a mean PFS of 14.4 ± 12.5 months.

Based on this institutional experience, DEB-TACE is an acceptable locoregional therapy choice for hepatic metastases of NET due to its tolerable safety profile and relative efficacy.