Comparison of Clinicopathologic Characteristics and Outcomes After Resection in Patients With Hepatocellular Carcinoma Treated in the United States, France, and Japan

Abstract

To compare the clinicopathologic characteristics and outcomes after resection of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) treated in the United States, France, and Japan. Some epidemiologic data suggests that HCC in different regions of the world may represent different forms of the disease. We compared the patient and tumor characteristics, underlying liver damage, and surgical outcomes of 586 patients who underwent resection of HCC from a multi-institutional database. A total of 169 patients were treated in the United States, 187 in France, and 230 in Japan. The median tumor size for patients treated in the United States was 8 cm, compared with 6 cm and 3.5 cm in France and Japan, respectively (P Conclusions: Although the etiology of HCC and clinicopathologic characteristics of patients treated at western and eastern centers vary widely, postresection 5-year survival is similar when controlling for these factors. Future studies should account for histopathologic differences using uniform criteria to allow better comparison of results.