Liver Cancer Therapies
There are two types of liver cancer: primary (cancer that originates in the liver) and secondary (cancer that originates from another location in the body).
Some of the risk factors associated with liver cancer are:
- Viral hepatitis (hepatitis B or hepatitis C) or cirrhosis
- Family history of liver cancer (someone in your family had liver cancer)
- Gender (men are more likely to get liver cancer than women)
- Certain metabolic diseases of the liver, such as excessive iron (hereditary hemochromatosis), excess copper (Wilson disease), and alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency.
Liver cancer may be diagnosed by abdominal imaging (including CT scan or MRI), blood test (alpha-fetoprotein), angiogram, or surgery.
Once a liver tumor is found, the patient undergoes imaging to determine the number and location of the tumors and whether a tumor has invaded a blood vessel or spread outside the liver. This process is referred to as staging of the liver cancer. It usually involves obtaining a chest CT scan and a bone scan to see if the tumor has spread into the lungs or bones. If there is no evidence of the tumor spreading to other organs, the patient is usually referred to surgery for resection or liver transplantation.
Some patients are not candidates for surgical treatment or will need additional treatment to decrease (downstaging) or slow the growth of the tumor. Such procedures include burning the tumor (radiofrequency ablation), localized liver chemoembolization (transarterial chemoembolization or radioembolization using TheraSphere), or radiation treatment with CyberKnife.
Liver tumor board
As part of our program, liver specialists from surgery, medical oncology, radiation oncology, radiology, and pathology meet weekly at a Tumor Board to evaluate and discuss patients for whom a multispecialty approach is being considered.