Impact of Low Versus Conventional Doses of Chemotherapy During Transcatheter Arterial Chemo-embolization on Serum Fibrosis Indicators and Survival of Liver Cancer Patients

Objectives: To explore the impact of low- vs conventional-dose chemotherapy via transcatheter arterialchemo-embolization (TACE) on serum fibrosis indicators and treatment efficacy of hepatocellular cancerpatients (HCC). Materials and
Methods: Patients fulfilling the eligibility criteria were assigned to TACE inGroup A (with low-dose chemotherapy) or Group B (conventional-dose chemotherapy). Four serum fibrosisrelated indicators, hyaluronic acid(HA), human pro-collagen type-Ⅲ (hPC-Ⅲ), laminin (LN), and collagentype-Ⅳ(Ⅳ-C) before TACE were compared with the values 7 days after TACE. The response rate and survivaltime were also compared between the two groups.
Results: Fifty patients with HCC were enrolled in this study,including 25 in Group A and 25 in Group B. No significant differences were detected between the two groups inthe four indicators before TACE. After TACE, the value of the four serum indicators increased significantly inGroup B. However, no significant differences regarding these four indicators were found in Group A after TACE.Significant differences were demonstrated between the two groups after TACE, but median survival time and1 or 2 year overall survival rates did not differ (P>0.05).
Conclusions: Low-, compared with conventional-dosechemotherapy exerts the same impact on the variation of fibrosis related indicators and has no influence onmedian survival time and survival rate after TACE in HCC patients.