Trends in long-term outcomes of patients with HCV-associated hepatocellular carcinoma after hepatectomy: A comparison before and after introduction of direct-acting antivirus therapy.

BACKGROUNDS: The success of direct-acting antiviral (DAA) therapy provides a cure for patients chronically infected with hepatitis C virus (HCV); however, outcomes after hepatectomy for HCV-associated hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) before and after DAA introduction remain poorly studied.

METHODS: Patients who underwent R0/R1 hepatectomy for HCV-associated HCC were retrospectively analyzed. Two time periods were defined: Pre-DAA (2007-2011, December 2013 was defined as the end of follow-up) and Post-DAA groups (2014-2018, December 2020 was defined as the end of follow-up). Propensity score matching (PSM) analyses were performed to highlight the effect of DAA therapy.

RESULTS: A total of 155 patients with HCV-associated HCC were included in this study (Pre-DAA group, n  = 103 and post-DAA group, n  = 52). In the Post-DAA group, DAA therapy was performed in 26 patients (50.0%), and all of these patients achieved sustained virologic response (SVR) (preoperative SVR, n  = 7; postoperative SVR, n  = 19). There was no significant difference between the two groups regarding surgical settings and tumor pathology. There was no significant difference in the 5-year overall survival (OS) rate (61.1% and 64.8%, pre- and post-DAA group, respectively, p  = 0.441); meanwhile, the 5-year recurrence-free survival (RFS) rate in the post-DAA group was better than the pre-DAA group (21.1% and 40.2%, p  = 0.073) with a trend toward significance. After PSM except for the postoperative SVR status, there were no significant differences in OS ( p  = 0.586) and RFS ( p  = 0.888).

CONCLUSIONS: This study showed that survival outcomes were not changed in hepatectomized cases of HCV-associated HCC before and after the introduction of DAA therapy.