A study on resectable hilar cholangiocarcinoma comparing neoadjuvant therapy combined with liver transplantation versus radical hepatectomy / 中华肝胆外科杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To compare the treatment outcomes of neoadjoint therapy combined with liver transplantation versus radical hepatectomy for patients with surgically resectable hilar cholangiocarcinoma.Methods:A retrospective study was performed on the data of 64 patients with resectable hilar cholangiocarcinoma operated from January 2009 to December 2014 at the Organ Transplantation Department of the First Central Hospital of Tianjin. There were 43 males and 21 females, with an average age of 61.2 years. There were 45 patients who underwent radical hepatectomy in the liver resection group, and 19 patients who underwent combined neoadjuvant therapy (radiotherapy combined with 5-fluorouracil intravenous drip, transcatheter lumen radiotherapy, capecitabine oral administration) and liver transplantation in the liver transplantation group. The recurrence rates and survival rate were compared between groups.Results:The 1, 3 and 5 years cumulative survival rates of the liver transplantation group were 89.5%, 73.7% and 63.2%, respectively, which were significantly better than those of the liver resection group (80.0%, 53.3% and 35.6%) ( P<0.05). The postoperative tumor recurrence rate in the liver transplantation group was 31.6% (6/19), which was significantly lower than that in the liver resection group of 60.0% (27/45) ( P<0.05). Subgroup analysis using postoperative pathological results showed the cumulative survival rates of patients without lymph node metastasis (N 0) and those with negative resection margins (R 0) were not significantly different between groups ( P>0.05). However, for patients with regional lymph node invasion (N 1) and with R 0 resection margin, the cumulative survival rates at 1, 3 and 5 years after liver transplantation were 83.3%, 66.7% and 50.0%, respectively, which were significantly superior to the 64.3%, 28.6% and 14.3% of the liver resection group ( P<0.05). Conclusion:Hepatectomy is recommended for patients with N 0 R 0 resectable hilar cholangiocarcinoma. For patients with hilar cholangiocarcinoma with marginally resectable N 1R 0, neoadjuvant therapy combined with liver transplantation resulted in significantly better long-term overall survival than resection.