Introduction. Hepatocellular carcinoma is one of the most prevalent cancers in the world and for less than 30-40% of patients radical treatment measures can be used. When such treatment options are not viable, systemic biological therapy with Sorafenib can be used. Sorafenib is a kinase inhibitor, that inhibits tumour cell proliferation and angiogenesis. The aim of this study is to determine treatment with Sorafenib efficacy depending on patients hepatic condition.
Materials and methods. A retrospective study was carried out analyzing patients that were treated with Sorafenib for hepatocellular carcinoma in the Hematology, Oncology and Transfusion Medicine Centre of Vilnius University Hospital Santariskiu Klinikos during the 2011-2015 period. Child-Pugh classification was used to separate patients into two groups: Child-Pugh A and Child-Pugh B. Information about chronic hepatic diseases, prior treatment and clinical laboratory results was gathered. Treatment efficacy was evaluated using patients’ survival results: progression free survival and overall survival. Fisher exact test was used for categorical variables and Mann-Whitney U test was used for continuous variables. Time to event data were estimated by Kaplan-Meier plots and median.
Results. A total of 34 patients were included, 20 of them had Child-Pugh A hepatic function class and the remaining 14 - Child-Pugh B class. The groups were homogenous based on age, sex and pretreatment results. Difference of survival results between groups were statistically insignificant (PFS - Child-Pugh A - 4.07 (95% CI - 2.41-5.72) vs. Child-Pugh B - 3.03 months (95% CI - 2.30-3.77); p = 0.151; OS - Child-Pugh A - 7.70 (95% CI - 4-27-11.13) vs. Child-Pugh B - 4.67 (95% CI - 1.61-7.72); p = 0.436).
Conclusions. Patients treated with Sorafenib in Child-Pugh A and Child- Pugh B groups had similar progression free and overall survival times.
