Case report: Massive hepatocellular carcinoma with complete response to the non-surgical systematic treatment strategy

Yun Li; Yanzhen Lai; Xuqiang Luo; Jian Wu; Kunpeng Wu; Haiqing Ma

doi:10.3389/fonc.2024.1291131

Case report: Massive hepatocellular carcinoma with complete response to the non-surgical systematic treatment strategy

Front Oncol. 2024 May 10:14:1291131. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2024.1291131. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Yun Li^#^{1

2}, Yanzhen Lai^#^{1

2}, Xuqiang Luo^{1

2}, Jian Wu^{1

2}, Kunpeng Wu^{1

2}, Haiqing Ma^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Oncology, Heyuan Hospital of Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital, Heyuan People's Hospital, Heyuan, Guangdong, China.
² Heyuan Key Laboratory of Molecular Diagnosis & Disease Prevention and Treatment, Doctors Station of Guangdong Province, Heyuan People's Hospital, Heyuan, Guangdong, China.
³ Medical Research Center, Medical Research Institute, Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital (Guangdong Academy of Medical Sciences), Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Background: The five-year recurrence rate of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains as high as 70%. A complete clinical response has not been observed without surgical resection. Here, we report a rare case of clinical complete response and long-term survival in a patient with massive HCC receiving treatment with immunotherapy, anti-angiogenic therapy, and radiotherapy.

Case description: A 38-year-old woman presented to our hospital for abdominal pain that persisted for 3 months. She was diagnosed as Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer(BCLC) stage A, with a Cancer of the Liver Italian Program (CLIP) score of 3, American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) Tumor-Node-Metastasis (TNM) staging systems stage IB. She refused surgical resection and trans-arterial chemoembolization and accepted a non-invasive systematic treatment strategy involving immunotherapy, anti-angiogenic therapy, and radiotherapy. Her tumor burden decreased, and she experienced partial response before radiotherapy. Following radiotherapy, she experienced a complete clinical response and has been alive for more than 36 months after her initial presentation. She is currently alive.

Conclusion: A non-invasive systematic treatment strategy is a potential radical treatment option for patients with massive HCC.

Keywords: anlotinib; complete response; hepatocellular cancer; radiotherapy; sindilizumab.

Publication types

Case Reports

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This study was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (82072719), the Natural Science Foundation of the Guangdong Province (2021A1515010790, 2023A1515012872), the Medical Scientific Research Foundation of Guangdong Province (B2023476, B2023112), the High-level HospitalConstruction Project of Heyuan People’s Hospital (YNKT202203, YNKT202215, YNKT202218), and the Science and Technology Project for Social Development of Heyuan (2021036, 2022007).