الفهرس | Only 14 pages are availabe for public view |
Abstract Hepatocellular carcinoma is one of the main complications of cirrhosis, and a’ serious health problem worldwide. The incidence of HCC in Western countries is low (approximately 4/100,000), while in some regions of Africa and Asia, HCC is the major cause of death among malignant diseases with an incidence up to 150/100,000. In Egypt, HCC contributed 2.75 % of all cancers, suggesting that Egypt is a low incidence area. Systemic chemotherapy for HCC has been of limited value in clinical practice, because only a small portion of patients obtains significant effects, and because the toxicity of chemotherapy often outweighs the benefits. Therefore, at present, only HCC patients with no indication for standard treatments (surgical resection, PEL, and TASTE) undergo chemotherapy. Surgical resection is the only treatmeni modality offering a chamx for cure. Albeit, only around 15 % of patients are suitable for radical surgery. Chemoembolization, radiotherapy, and alcohol injection have been used to control local disease with some success but with no significant impact on survival. Therefore, identification of new effective drugs in the treatment of inoperable HCC is urgently needed. Endocrine treatment has been used in other types of malignancies and in some cases has been proved useful. Basic research has shown the association of liver carcinogenesis with several hormones. |