Retrospective Study Of The Effectiveness Of Radiofrequency Ablation For Small Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Background/PurposeRadiofrequency ablation tends to be regarded as a minimally invasive technology. It has been reported that radiofrequency ablation may be preferable to other modalities for the treatment of small hepatocellular carcinoma(HCC),by contributing to improve overall survival and disease-free survival.The complications and long-term effectiveness were studied for patients with small hepatocellular carcinoma(HCC) (≤3cm in diameters) treated by percutaneous radiofrequency ablation(RFA) in our study.MethodsA retrospective study was conducted with 40 patients who initially underwent radiofrequency ablation for HCC.The post-RFA complications,treatment-related mortality,the complete remission rate,disease-free and overall survival rate were followed up and evaluated.ResultsWith a median follow-up of 40 months,the effective rate was 95.0%.The post-RFA liver function based on albumin and bilirubin wasn't worse than that of pre-RFA (P=0.243,0.458 ).The incidence of complication and length of hospital stay were 5.0%and 4.9±1.5,respectively.Local recurrence developed in 16 patients(40.0%).The disease-free and overall survival rates at 1,2,3 years were 91.6%,85.2%,55.4%,and 93.7%,86.2%,77.5%,respectively.ConclusionsRFA can produce high complete remission rate and excellent long-term effectiveness for HCC patients with poor liver function and other severe diseases.And RFA is significantly superior for clinical treatment of small HCC in terms of less complication and shorter length of hospital stay.