Efficacy and Safety of Conversion Surgery for Advanced Hepatocellular Carcinoma After Hepatic Arterial Infusion Chemotherapy.

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to investigate the efficacy and safety of conversion surgery for advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) after hepatic arterial infusion chemotherapy (HAIC).

PATIENTS AND METHODS: Data from 172 HCC patients treated at Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center between January 2016 and June 2021 with effective assessment of HAIC treatment response were retrospectively analyzed. Clinical pathological data, treatment process, survival, and occurrence of adverse events were recorded. Patients were grouped according to whether they achieved imaging remission after HAIC, underwent conversion surgery, and met the surgical resection criteria. Efficacy and safety were analyzed.

RESULTS: The median progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) in the imaging remission group were 8.6 months and 26.3 months, respectively, which were longer than the 4.6 months ( P <0.05) and 15.6 months ( P <0.05) in the nonremission group. Compared with 6.7 months and 18.9 months in the HAIC maintenance group, the median PFS and median OS in the conversion surgery group were 16.5 months ( P <0.05) and 45.0 months ( P <0.05), but there was a higher risk of treatment-related hemoglobin decrease, alanine aminotransferase increase, aspartate aminotransferase increase, and total bilirubin increase ( P <0.05). The risk of biliary fistula, abdominal hemorrhage and ascites in the HAIC conversion surgery group was higher than that of the single surgery group ( P <0.05). Compared with the conversion surgery group, the median PFS and median OS of patients in the HAIC maintenance group who met the resection criteria were shorter: 7.1 months ( P <0.05) and 21.7 months ( P <0.05), respectively. All adverse events during the study were less than moderate, and no toxicity-related deaths occurred during follow-up.

CONCLUSION: HAIC-based conversion therapy had acceptable toxic effects and could effectively stabilize intrahepatic lesions in advanced HCC, improve the survival benefit of patients, and provide some patients with the opportunity for conversion surgery to further improve prognosis.