Palliative Liver Radiotherapy (RT) for Symptomatic Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC)

This study aims at evaluating the symptom response, response duration, and toxicity of single dose palliative liver radiotherapy (RT) for symptomatic HCC patients. We reviewed unresectable HCC patients treated with palliative RT in our institution. Eligible patients were unsuitable or refractory to trans-arterial chemoembolization (TACE) and stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT), with an index symptom of pain or abdominal discomfort. The primary outcome was the percentage of patients with clinical improvement of index symptom at 1 month. Secondary outcomes were response duration, toxicities, alpha-feto protein (AFP) response, and radiological response. Fifty-two patients were included in the study. The index symptom was pain in 34 patients (65.4%), and abdominal discomfort (34.6%) in 18 patients. At 1 month, 51.9% of patients had improvement of symptoms. Median time to symptom progression was 89 days (range: 12–392 days). Treatment was well tolerated with only 2 patients (3.8%) developing grade 3 GI toxicities. AFP response, radiological response rate, and disease control rate at 3 months were 48.6%, 15.1%, and 54.5% respectively. Half of the patients had improvement of index symptoms after receiving palliative liver RT with median response duration of 3 months. The treatment was well tolerated with minimal toxicities.