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©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
Risk factors for deterioration of long-term liver function after radiofrequency ablation therapy
Koichi Honda, Masataka Seike, Junya Oribe, Mizuki Endo, Mie Arakawa, Hiroki Syo, Masao Iwao, Masanori Tokoro, Junko Nishimura, Tetsu Mori, Tsutomu Yamashita, Satoshi Fukuchi, Toyokichi Muro, Kazunari Murakami
Koichi Honda, Masataka Seike, Junya Oribe, Mizuki Endo, Mie Arakawa, Hiroki Syo, Masao Iwao, Masanori Tokoro, Junko Nishimura, Tetsu Mori, Kazunari Murakami, Department of Gastroenterology, Faculty of Medicine, Oita University, Yufu-City, Oita 879-5593, Japan
Tsutomu Yamashita, Satoshi Fukuchi, Toyokichi Muro, De-partment of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, National Hospital Organization Oita Medical Center, Oita City, Oita 870-0263, Japan
Author contributions: Honda K wrote the manuscpipt; Honda K, Seike M, Oribe J, Endo M, Arakawa M, Syo H, Iwao M, Tokoro M, Nishimura J, Mori T, Yamashita T, Fukuchi S, Muro T and Murakami K performed the clinical work; Seike M and Murakami K revised the manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: This research was approved by the Ethics Committee of Oita University and Oita Medical Center.
Informed consent statement: This is a retrospective research. The additional informed consent from the patients does not apply.
Conflict-of-interest statement: We have no financial relation-ships to disclose.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Koichi Honda, MD, PhD, Department of Gastroenterology, Faculty of Medicine, Oita University, 1-1 Idaigaoka, Hasama-machi, Yufu City, Oita 879-5593, Japan. hondak@oita-u.ac.jp
Telephone: +81-97-5866193 Fax: +81-97-5866194
Received: January 4, 2016
Peer-review started: January 8, 2016
First decision: March 1, 2016
Revised: March 13, 2016
Accepted: March 24, 2016
Article in press: March 25, 2016
Published online: May 8, 2016
AIM: To identify factors that influence long-term liver function following radiofrequency ablation (RFA) in patients with viral hepatitis-related hepatocellular carcinoma.
METHODS: A total of 123 patients with hepatitis B virus- or hepatitis C virus-related hepatocellular car-cinoma (HCC) (n = 12 and n = 111, respectively) were enrolled. Cumulative rates of worsening Child-Pugh (CP) scores (defined as a 2-point increase) were examined.
RESULTS: CP score worsening was confirmed in 22 patients over a mean follow-up period of 43.8 ± 26.3 mo. Multivariate analysis identified CP class, platelet count, and aspartate aminotransferase levels as signi-ficant predictors of a worsening CP score (P = 0.000, P = 0.011 and P = 0.024, respectively). In contrast, repeated RFA was not identified as a risk factor for liver function deterioration.
CONCLUSION: Long-term liver function following RFA was dependent on liver functional reserve, the degree of fibrosis present, and the activity of the hepatitis condition for this cohort. Therefore, in order to maintain liver function for an extended period following RFA, suppression of viral hepatitis activity is important even after the treatment of HCC.
Core tip: This study was conducted to identify risk factors for liver function deterioration following radio-frequency ablation (RFA) in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and viral hepatitis. A total of 123 patients with hepatitis B virus- or hepatitis C virus-related HCC were enrolled. Cumulative rates of wor-sening Child-Pugh (CP) scores (defined as a 2-point increase) following RFA were examined. CP class, platelet count, and aspartate aminotransferase levels were identified as significant predictors of a worsening CP score. Suppression of viral hepatitis activity with anti-viral therapy is important even after the treatment of HCC in order to maintain liver function following RFA.
