Retrospective Cohort Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2021. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Clin Cases. Sep 26, 2021; 9(27): 8020-8026
Published online Sep 26, 2021. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v9.i27.8020
Clinical stages of recurrent hepatocellular carcinoma: A retrospective cohort study
Si-Yang Yao, Bin Liang, Yuan-Yuan Chen, Yun-Tian Tang, Xiao-Feng Dong, Tian-Qi Liu
Si-Yang Yao, Bin Liang, Yuan-Yuan Chen, Yun-Tian Tang, Xiao-Feng Dong, Tian-Qi Liu, Department of Hepatobiliary-Pancreatic-Splenic Surgery, The People’s Hospital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Nanning 530021, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China
Author contributions: Liu TQ proposed the study; Yao SY and Liang B performed the research and wrote the first draft; Chen YY, Tang YT, and Dong XF collected and analyzed the data; all authors contributed to the design and interpretation of the study; and Liu TQ is the guarantor.
Supported by Self-financed Research Program of Health and Family Planning Commission of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, No. Z20180722.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by The People’s Hospital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Institutional Review Board (Approval No. KY-LW-2019-4).
Informed consent statement: Patients were not required to give informed consent to the study because the analysis used anonymous clinical data that were obtained after each patient agreed to treatment by written consent.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors have no conflict of interest related to the manuscript.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (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/
Corresponding author: Tian-Qi Liu, PhD, Chief Doctor, Department of Hepatobiliary- Pancreatic-Splenic Surgery, The People’s Hospital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, No. 6 Taoyuan Road, Nanning 530021, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China. gxljrqt@163.com
Received: May 16, 2021
Peer-review started: May 16, 2021
First decision: June 15, 2021
Revised: June 28, 2021
Accepted: August 3, 2021
Article in press: August 3, 2021
Published online: September 26, 2021
ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS
Research background

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the second leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide, and has relatively high recurrence rates. At present, there has not been a unanimous opinion for the treatment of recurrent HCC, and clinical stages of recurrent HCC remain controversial.

Research motivation

This study showed that the Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer (BCLC) staging system is applicable to recurrent HCC, and it is essential to formulate the standard of clinical stages for recurrent HCC, which would contribute to the development of more precise and individual treatment plans for recurrent HCC patients.

Research objectives

The aim of this study was to assess the applicability of the BCLC staging for recurrent HCC and the need to establish clinical stage criteria for recurrent HCC.

Research methods

The clinicopathological data of 81 patients with recurrent HCC were collected. The patients were divided into three groups according to the BCLC staging system as follows: (1) Group A with BCLC stage A, 51 patients; (2) Group B with BCLC stage B, 14 patients; and (3) Group C with BCLC stage C, 16 patients. The median time to tumor recurrence time and the median overall survival were compared.

Research results

The median time to tumor recurrence in groups A, B, and C was 16 ± 1.5 mo, 10 ± 2.8 mo, and 6 ± 0.5 mo, respectively, with a statistically significant difference among them; no statistically significant difference was noted between group A and group B, although there were statistically significant differences between group A and group C and between group B and group C. The median overall survival time in groups A, B, and C was 42 ± 5.1 mo, 22 ± 3.1 mo, and 13 ± 1.8 mo, respectively, with a statistically significant difference among them; there were statistically significant differences between group A and group B, group A and group C, and group B and group C.

Research conclusions

There are different prognoses in recurrent HCC patients according to the BCLC. Therefore, BCLC staging is applicable to recurrent HCC and it is essential to formulate clinical stage criteria for recurrent HCC.

Research perspectives

Recurrent HCC patients with different clinical stages have different prognoses, and it is essential to formulate more precise clinical stage criteria for recurrent HCC.