Neoadjuvant therapy: Dawn of reducing the high post-surgery recurrence rate of hepatocellular carcinoma

The high postoperative recurrence rate remains a major challenge in the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) following resection. Increasing research has been delved into investigating the role of neoadjuvant therapy on the prognosis of resectable HCC. Recent trends in combination therapy with molecularly targeted agents and immune checkpoint inhibitors have significantly improved the efficacy of systemic antitumor treatments, yielding survival benefits exceeding 40%. Neoadjuvant therapy for HCC, whether based on systemic antitumor treatments, locoregional therapies, or their combination, has emerged as a promising research direction. However, there remains a matter of debate on neoadjuvant therapy. In this review, we summarize and discuss the research progress and challenges of neoadjuvant therapy for HCC over the past five years from the perspective of Chinese guidelines to provide new insights and future directions in this field.