Background: The prognosis of advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains poor, particularly in patients with tumor thrombi (TT) in the major vessels.
Patients and methods: From July 1992 to October 2004, 161 patients diagnosed as having advanced HCC with major vascular involvement were seen consecutively at our hospital. Among these patients, 32 (20%) underwent surgical resection [16 complete resection (CR), 16 reductive resection (RR)]. Eighteen patients (11%) received radiotherapy (RT), 73 (45%) underwent transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE) or transcatheter arterial infusion chemotherapy (TAI), 8 (5%) with distant metastases received systemic chemotherapy, and 30 (19%) received palliative therapy.
Results: Excluding the CR group, the patients in the RR group had a higher 1-year survival rate than the other treatment groups. However, there was no significant difference in the overall survival rates of the RR, RT, and TACE/TAI groups. When we evaluated prognostic factors to clarify the indications for RR in the multidisciplinary treatment of patients with advanced HCC with TT, prothrombin activity (PA) was identified as a significant independent preoperative factor for overall survival in the RR group. The survival rate in patients with PA of < or = 78% was significantly lower than that of patients with PA of > 78% (P = 0.0004). The median survival time of patients with serum PA of > 78% who underwent RR was 13.9 months and that of patients who underwent CR was 9.1 months, with no survival difference between the groups.
Conclusion: In advanced HCC with major vascular involvement, patients who had RR with PA of greater 78% achieved a similar survival to those who had CR. The surgeon should still proceed with RR in those patients with serum PA of > 78% if CR does not seem feasible on preoperative evaluation.