Abstract

To evaluate the effect of preoperative treatment on proliferative activity and prognosis of the hepatocellular carcinomas(HCCs), fifty-three surgically resected HCCs were studied. Twenty cases were treated preoperatively and thirty-three were not treated before surgery. The proliferation index(PI, % of proliferating cell nuclear antigen positive cells) of the remaining cancer cases(35.41). Although PI was similar among gross types and among histologic grades, tumors of the expanding type and of the histologic grade I revealed distinctly low PI in pretreated cases. Two-year survival rate was not significantly different between pretreated and not-pretreated cases(67.4 vs 52.7). But the differences between gross types(p<0.05) and between histologic grades(p<0.01) were significant. Total necrosis of tumor occurred in five pretreated patients, all of whom were alive during two-year follow-up. Smaller HCCs showed better prognosis(p<0.01). Although PI appeared not correlated well with the two tear survival rate, the pretreated HCCs preoperative modalities induce tumor necrosis, but do not reduce the proliferative activity of tumor cells significantly, and that pretreatment does not affect the long-term prognosis of HCCs except for the accasions of total necrosis of tumor.

• Keywords: Preoperative modalities;Proliferative activity;Hepatocellular carcinoma;Small hepatocellular carcinoma;Prognosis;