Concurrent hyperglycemia does not influence the long-term prognosis of unresectable hepatocellular carcinomas

AIM:The association has been established between thedisorder of carbohydrate metabolism and liver cancer.However,little is known regarding the impact of concurrenthyperglycemia on prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma(HCC).The present study aimed at solving this problem.METHODS:A total of 225 patients included in this study,were admitted from January 1998 to December 2001 for anunresectable HCC proven by histological and imagingexaminations.Most of the patients received interventionaltreatment,radiation and biotherapy.Response was evaluatedby computerized tomography(CT)scan conducted 4-6 weeksfollowing completion of the treatment,and then every 3months.Survival was calculated from the beginning oftreatment using the Kaplan-Meier method.Pretreatment,treatment and follow-up variables with possible prognosticsignificance were analyzed.A stepwise multivariate analysiswas performed using the Cox regression model,and aprognostic index was obtained.RESULTS:No differences were observed in suwival parametersbetween the patients with and without hyperglycemia,mediansurvival times of the patients were being 26±3.46 months and29.5±2.04 months,respectively,and the 3-year survival ratewas 8.36 % and 9.62 %,respectively.The univariate analysisindicated that there were several survival-associated variablesincluding serum AFP level,clinical stage,Child-Pugh grade,method of treatment,size and number of tumor nodule(s).However,only the clinical stage,Child-Pugh grade and thetreatment procedure were proved to be independent prognosticfactors in the multivariate analysis.CONCLUSION: This study indicates that hyperglycemia does not influence the long-term prognosis of HCC, and concurrent hyperglycemia should not be considered as an unfavorable prognostic factor during the treatment of patients with HCC.