Optimal 10-mm window: Integrating peri-ablation radiomics with preoperative features to predict early hepatocellular carcinoma recurrence after thermal ablation

Table 1 Characteristics of the included patients, n (%)/mean ± SD

	Training set			P value	Internal validation set (n = 72)	P value	External validation set (n = 61)	P value
	Total (n = 168)	ER (n = 67)	Non-ER (n = 101)
Patient characteristic
Age (years)	56.54 ± 9.56	56.15 ± 9.73	56.79 ± 9.48	0.671	56.28 ± 8.73	0.84	54.95 ± 9.34	0.266
Sex				0.874		0.215		0.173
Male	123 (73.2)	48 (71.6)	75 (74.3)		47 (65.3)		50 (65.3)
Female	45 (26.8)	19 (28.4)	26 (25.7)		25 (34.7)		11 (34.7)
Etiology				0.147		0.915		0.934
HBV	155 (92.3)	64 (95.5)	91 (90.1)		67 (93.1)		57 (93.4)
HCV	9 (5.4)	3 (4.5)	6 (5.9)		3 (4.2)		3 (4.9)
Others	4 (2.4)	0 (0.0)	4 (4.0)		2 (2.8)		1 (1.6)
Tumor characteristics
Tumor size (cm)	2.39 ± 0.91	2.72 ± 0.91	2.18 ± 0.91	< 0.001	2.33 ± 0.81	0.651	2.46 ± 0.97	0.612
No. of tumors				< 0.001		0.705		0.516
Solitary	123 (73.2)	39 (58.2)	84 (83.2)		51 (70.8)		42 (68.9)
Multiple	45 (26.8)	28 (41.8)	17 (16.8)		21 (29.2)		19 (31.1)
Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer stage				< 0.001		0.702		0.862
0	46 (27.4)	5 (7.5)	41 (40.6)		18 (25.0)		16 (26.2)
A	122 (72.6)	62 (92.5)	60 (59.4)		54 (75.0)		45 (73.8)
Laboratory index
AST, IU/L	36.86 ± 5.25	37.00 ± 5.38	36.76 ± 5.19	0.779	36.25 ± 5.22	0.408	35.19 ± 5.41	0.036
ALT, IU/L	31.01 ± 21.78	34.42 ± 23.96	28.76 ± 20.01	0.099	33.12 ± 25.71	0.517	28.23 ± 15.93	0.362
TBIL, μmol/L	24.59 ± 13.65	25.63 ± 14.80	23.89 ± 12.87	0.423	21.34 ± 11.74	0.08	21.44 ± 12.96	0.12
ALB, g/L	30.78 ± 12.66	31.36 ± 10.08	30.40 ± 14.14	0.634	33.43 ± 20.90	0.229	32.74 ± 10.53	0.28
r-GGT (U/L)	35.78 ± 26.68	38.60 ± 31.92	33.91 ± 22.52	0.266	32.01 ± 18.89	0.278	40.42 ± 29.96	0.261
PLT, × 109/L	110.54 ± 55.67	106.62 ± 51.70	113.14 ± 58.14	0.459	112.81 ± 56.08	0.774	104.41 ± 54.45	0.459
Child-Pugh grade				0.249		0.975		0.204
A	121 (72.0)	47 (70.1)	74 (73.3)		52 (72.2)		49 (80.3)
B	47 (29.0)	20 (29.9)	27 (26.7)		20 (27.8)		12 (19.7)
AFP, ng/mL	215.98 ± 351.69	329.83 ± 440.58	140.44 ± 252.97	0.001	187.27 ± 331.25	0.556	294.55 ± 378.51	0.144

ER: Early recurrence; HBV: Hepatitis B virus; HCV: Hepatitis C virus; AST: Aspartate aminotransferase; ALT: Alanine aminotransferase; TBIL: Total bilirubin; ALB: Albumin; r-GGT: Gamma-glutamyl transferase; PLT: Platelet; AFP: Alpha-fetoprotein.