Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the prognostic significance of the preoperatively assessed tumor doubling time (DT) in patients undergoing liver resection for mass-forming intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (IHC).
Methods: We evaluated 79 patients who underwent curative resection for IHC, and in whom the same imaging technique was preoperatively available in two consecutive occasions, to allow the calculation of the DT. The influence of DT and other clinical and pathological variables on tumor recurrence and patient survival was determined by the Kaplan-Meier method and uni- and multivariate analysis.
Results: Median overall survival was 40 months; 1-, 3-, and 5-year survival rates were 86.1, 55.1, and 35.1 %, respectively. Median disease-free survival was 17 months; 1-, 3-, and 5-year disease-free survival rates were 62.0, 29.1, and 23.3 %, respectively. At univariate analysis, DT <70 days (p < 0.001) and advanced tumor stage (p = 0.024) were associated with worse overall survival and maintained significance at multivariate analysis.
Conclusions: DT is a clinically useful parameter to estimate the prognosis of "mass-forming" IHC in patients undergoing liver resection.