title: Antiviral therapy improves the survival rate and decreases recurrences and fatalities in liver cancer patients following curative resection: A meta-analysis.
abstract: The present study aimed to investigate the impact of postoperative antiviral treatment on tumor recurrence, fatalities and survival of patients with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection-related primary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). A systematic meta-analysis was performed. All the studies comparing nucleos(t)ide analogues (NAs) versus placebo or no treatment were considered. The results were expressed as relative ratio (RR) for 1-, 3- and 5-year recurrence-free survival (RFS) and overall survival (OS), recurrence HCC and fatalities with 95% confidence intervals (CI) using STATA 11.0. In total, 15 trials with 7,619 patients were included. There were significant improvements for 1-, 3- and 5-year RFS (RR, 1.09; P=0.003; RR, 1.202; P<0.001; and RR, 1.219; P=0.02; respectively) and in 3- and 5-year OS (RR, 1.087, P=0.006; and RR, 1.186; P<0.001) in the NAs group compared with the control group. Sensitivity analyses confirmed the robustness of the results. In addition, the significantly high rate of recurrence HCC and fatalities existed in the control group (RR, 1.301; P=0.002; and RR, 1.816, P<0.001). One study was for an entecavir (ETV)-treated group compared with an adefovir (ADV)-treated group and lamivudine (LAM)-treated group. The 3-year disease-free survival rate for the ETV group was significantly better compared with the ADV and LAM groups [hazard ratio (HR), 0.810; P=0.049; and HR, 0.737; P=0.007]. The present study demonstrated the beneficial effects of NAs therapy following curative treatment of HBV-related HCC. ETV may be the superior choice compared to ADV or LAM for the antiviral treatment.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Organ Failure Research, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Viral Hepatitis Research, Department of Infectious Diseases, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510515, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Hao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510515, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Yuchen
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Organ Failure Research, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Viral Hepatitis Research, Department of Infectious Diseases, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510515, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Guosheng
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Yuan
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Organ Failure Research, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Viral Hepatitis Research, Department of Infectious Diseases, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510515, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Guangyao
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510515, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Dinghua
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Organ Failure Research, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Viral Hepatitis Research, Department of Infectious Diseases, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510515, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Yuanping
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhou
keywords: antiviral; curative; hepatitis B virus; hepatocellular carcinoma; meta-analysis