Background/aims: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the third leading cause of cancer and the 5 year survival rate is 9.6% in Korea. To develop a strategy for surveillance and treatments, we studied the recent clinical characteristics of HCC diagnosed at single institution in Korea, where is in an endemic area of chronic hepatitis B.
Methods: One thousand and seventy eight patients with HCC who visited the National Cancer Center between June 2001 and December 2003 were retrospectively studied.
Results: The male/female ratio was 4.5:1. The mean age of the patients was 56.3 years. 74.2% of patient had hepatitis B virus (HBV) infections, 8.6% had hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections, 6.9% of the patients abused alcohol and 10.3% of the patients had non-B non-C considered as the etiologic factors of their HCC. Only 10.0% of patients had a tumor sized 2 cm or less and 53.3% of patients had a large tumor over 5 cm in diameter. 33.2% of patients had a single tumor. At the time of diagnosis, the modified UICC staging was as follows: 6.5%, 20.1%, 30.9%, 25.2% and 17.3% in stages I, II, III, IVa and IVb, respectively. The initial treatment performed was transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (48.2%), radiofrequency ablation (1.5%), hepatic resection (11.2%), systemic chemotherapy (7.5%), radiotherapy (2.1%), and conservative medical treatments (29.5%). The mean number of treatments was 1.65. The response rates to the initial treatments were 27.9% (complete response), 23.6% (partial response), 7.5% (minimal response), 14.2% (stable disease), and 30.4% (progressive disease).
Conclusions: HBV infection is a major etiologic factor for Korean HCC patients. Most cases are still in advanced stages and these cases responded poorly to any treatments. The national surveillance program and its guideline for HCC are expected to improve the survival of HCC patients.