ABSTRACT
Objective: To investigate the influence of gelatin sponge microparticles-TACE (GSMs-TACE) on myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) in peripheral blood of patients with Barcelona clinic liver cancer (BCLC) classification stage B hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Methods: Five patients with clinically diagnosed BCLC B-stage HCC (HCC group) underwent GSMs-TACE. Flow cytometry was used to detect the frequency of MDSCs (the proportion of MDSCs clusters to HLA-DR-cell) in the peripheral blood of patients before GSMs-TACE and 10 days as well as 30 days after operation, respectively. Seven healthy volunteers (normal control group) were enrolled. The MDSCs frequency of normal control group was detected simultaneously with HCC group before GSMs-TACE. Statistical analysis was performed to compare the differences of the frequency of MDSCs in HCC patients before and after GSMs-TACE. And the frequency of MDSCs of HCC group was compared with that of normal control group. Results: The frequency of MDSCs in peripheral blood of patients with HCC before GSMs-TACE was (30.26±12.12)%, which decreased to (10.22±3.79)% after 10 days and decreased to (7.33±3.38)% after 30 days (P<0.001). Pairwise comparison showed that the frequency of MDSCs at 30 days (P<0.001) and 10 days (P=0.011) after GSMs-TACE was lower than that before operation,respectively. The frequency of preoperative MDSCs of HCC group was statistically higher than that of normal control group ([30.26±12.12]% vs [3.41±1.89]%, t=5.876, P<0.001). Conclusion: The frequency of MDSCs in peripheral blood of patients with BCLC B-stage HCC significantly reduced after GSMs-TACE treatment. GSMs-TACE treatment has positive regulation effect on the immune function of patients.