Effectiveness of combined (131)I-chTNT and radiofrequency ablation therapy in treating advanced hepatocellular carcinoma

To investigate the effectiveness of monoclonal antibody ((131)I-chTNT) and radiofrequency ablation (RFA) combination therapy in treating middle-advanced stage hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Thirty-four patients diagnosed with HCC patients, divided into two groups comprised of 22 and 12 cases were included in this retrospective study. The two groups received RFA with or without ((131)I-chTNT) therapy, respectively. The patients in these groups were followed up for a median of 31 and 35 months, respectively. Patient survival was evaluated using Kaplan-Meier method and safety profiles were determined by analyzing liver, thyroid, and bone marrow toxicities. This retrospective study showed that survival time of the patients who received combination therapy was significantly longer than that of the RFA group (P = 0.052). The median progress-free survival of patients in the two groups was 23 and 7 months, respectively, and the difference was significant (P = 0.04). Tumor recurred in 3.5-8.7 months in four of the combination group patients, among which three had newly developed lesions. The red blood cells and platelets counts were not altered on day 7 and 1 month of the treatment, however, number of white blood cells was significantly increased on day 7 which was reversed back to the normal range in 2 weeks. The ALT and AST were also not significantly altered on day 7 and 1 month of therapy. In middle-advanced stage HCC patients, the combination of (131)I-chTNT and RFA therapy was found to be significantly more effective than the RFA treatment alone as assessed in short-term follow-up. However, the dose we used was insufficient to completely block the local recurrence of the lesions with a diameter of 5 cm or larger.