Copyright
©The Author(s) 2022. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Oncol. Sep 15, 2022; 14(9): 1622-1636
Published online Sep 15, 2022. doi: 10.4251/wjgo.v14.i9.1622
Published online Sep 15, 2022. doi: 10.4251/wjgo.v14.i9.1622
Immunotherapy for nonalcoholic fatty liver disease-related hepatocellular carcinoma: Lights and shadows
Federico Costante, Carlo Airola, Francesco Santopaolo, Antonio Gasbarrini, Maurizio Pompili, Francesca Romana Ponziani, Internal Medicine and Gastroenterology-Hepatology Unit, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario Agostino Gemelli IRCCS, Roma 00168, Italy
Antonio Gasbarrini, Maurizio Pompili, Francesca Romana Ponziani, Catholic University, Largo Francesco Vito 1, 00168 Roma, Italy
Author contributions: Costante F and Airola C revised literature; Costante F, Airola C, Santopaolo F and Ponziani FR wrote the paper; Pompili M, Gasbarrini A, Santopaolo F and Ponziani FR supervised and revised the paper.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflict of interest to declare.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Francesca Romana Ponziani, MD, PhD, Internal Medicine and Gastroenterology-Hepatology Unit, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario Agostino Gemelli IRCCS, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Largo Agostino Gemelli 8, Roma 00168, Italy. francesca.ponziani@gmail.com
Received: March 18, 2022
Peer-review started: March 18, 2022
First decision: April 17, 2022
Revised: May 5, 2022
Accepted: July 5, 2022
Article in press: July 5, 2022
Published online: September 15, 2022
Processing time: 174 Days and 14.1 Hours
Peer-review started: March 18, 2022
First decision: April 17, 2022
Revised: May 5, 2022
Accepted: July 5, 2022
Article in press: July 5, 2022
Published online: September 15, 2022
Processing time: 174 Days and 14.1 Hours
Core Tip
Core tip: Complex interactions involving the immune system, angiogenesis and inflammation are associated with the pathogenesis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Recent reviews suggested lower efficacy of immunotherapy in patients with nonviral HCC. This calls into question the need to stratify patients to maximize the effectiveness of immunotherapeutic agents. In this study, we provided the latest report on the tumor microenvironment structure and its implications in response to immunotherapy in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease-related HCC and also discussed the efficacy of first-line systemic treatment in this patient population.