Rate of local tumor progression following radiofrequency ablation of pathologically early hepatocellular carcinoma

Table 1 Comparison of clinical characteristics between patients with early hepatocellular carcinoma and patients with typical hepatocellular carcinoma

	eHCC	tHCC	P value
Number of nodules	50	187
Follow-up days1, median (range)	1213 (216-2137)	1116 (181-2328)	0.1582
Age, mean (range)	69.8 (50-87)	71.6 (54-84)	0.2002
Child-Pugh score, A/B	49/1	179/8	0.0992
Tumor diameter in mm, mean (range)	15.8 (10-23)	15.6 (6-30)	0.1542
Sex, male/female	35/15	125/58	0.8343
Etiology, HCV/HBV/alcohol/others4	41/4/6/1	139/29/8/11	0.1985

¹The follow-up days lasted until local tumor recurrence or the last examination using either contrast-enhanced CT or contrast-enhanced MRI;

²According to the Mann-Whitney U test;

³According to the χ² test;

⁴Others: non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, primary biliary cirrhosis, or unknown;

⁵According to the χ² test, compared between HCV and not HCV. CT: Computed tomography; eHCC: Early hepatocellular carcinoma; HBV: Hepatitis B virus; HCV: Hepatitis C virus; MRI: Magnetic resonance imaging; tHCC: Typical hepatocellular carcinoma.

Table 2 Evaluation of thinnest ablative margins for early hepatocellular carcinoma (n = 50) and typical hepatocellular carcinoma (n = 187) classified into two groups according to contrast-enhanced ultrasonography

	eHCC	tHCC	P value1
AM 0 to < 5 mm	80% (40/50)	85.5% (160/187)	NS
AM ≥ 5 mm	20% (10/50)	14.4% (27/187)	NS

¹Comparison between percentage of each classification of eHCC and tHCC according to χ² test. AM 0 to < 5 mm: thinnest AM equal to 0 mm or more and less than 5 mm; AM ≥ 5 mm: thinnest AM equal to 5 mm or more. AM: Ablative margin; eHCC: Early hepatocellular carcinoma; NS: Not significant; tHCC: Typical hepatocellular carcinoma.

Table 3 Frequency of local tumor progression classified into two groups according to ablative margin for early hepatocellular carcinoma (n = 50) and typical hepatocellular carcinoma (n = 187)

	AM 0 to < 5 mm	AM ≥ 5 mm
Local tumor progression
eHCC	2.5% (1/40)	0% (0/10)
tHCC	27.5% (44/160)	7.4% (2/27)
P value1	0.01	NS

¹Comparison between percentage of each classification of eHCC and tHCC according to Fisher’s exact test. AM 0 to < 5 mm: thinnest AM equal to 0 mm or more and less than 5 mm; AM ≥ 5 mm: thinnest AM equal to 5 mm or more. AM: Ablative margin; eHCC: Early hepatocellular carcinoma; NS: Not significant; tHCC: Typical hepatocellular carcinoma.