Calcium channel blockers improve the prognosis of patients with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma after resection

Background: Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma is the second most common primary cancer of the liver. It is highly malignant and its prognosis is very poor. Although there have been various reports on the effects of calcium channel blockers on cancer, the effects of calcium channel blockers on intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma have not been reported so far.

Methods: Seventy-nine patients diagnosed with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma by hepatectomy between January 2002 and May 2019 were retrospectively evaluated. We compared prognosis and time to recurrence between patients treated with calcium channel blockers (CCBs) (n = 29) and those not treated with CCBs (n = 50). Propensity score matching reduced confounding biases and yielded 25 matched patient pairs. Survival between groups was compared using Kaplan-Meier analyses, logrank tests, and Cox proportional hazard regression models.

Results: Overall survival and recurrence-free survival of the CCBs group were significantly longer than those of the non-CCBs group OS in the original cohort and matched cohort (98 months vs 45 months, p = 0.010; 96 months vs 22 months, p = 0.020, respectively). Multivariate analyses showed that CCBs treatment was independently associated with overall survival (HR, 0.37; 95% CI 0.16-0.85; p = 0.019) and recurrence-free survival (HR, 0.39; 95% CI 0.17-0.90; p = 0.020) in the original cohort and matched cohort, respectively.

Conclusion: CCBs treatment might improve prognosis of patients with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma.