Hepatocellular Carcinoma: From Molecular Basis to Novel Treatment Approaches
1Çukurova University, Adana, Turkey
2Otto-von-Guericke University, Magdeburg, Germany
3Izmir Biomedicine and Genome Center, Izmir, Turkey
4Florence Nightingale Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey
5Tokyo University, Tokyo, Japan
Hepatocellular Carcinoma: From Molecular Basis to Novel Treatment Approaches
Description
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the second leading cause of death from cancer, with approximately 700,000 new cases annually worldwide. It is one of the cancers for which the major causes are known, and it is thus preventable, in principle. Those causes are hepatitis B (HBV), hepatitis C (HCV), alcoholism, dietary mycotoxin exposure, combinations of these, and the increasing epidemic of obesity-associated cirrhosis (NAFL, NASH). Understanding molecular mechanisms has increased greatly in recent years, coupled with the concept that the tumor/HCC microenvironment can modulate both hepatocarcinogenesis and the human biology of HCC. Understanding of cell cycle in general and HCC cell growth signaling in particular has advanced, so has the identification of “druggable” therapeutic targets, including growth factors and their receptors, as well as immune checkpoint inhibitors. As a result, the therapeutic choices have increased from surgical, for the last 40 years, to a wide range of systemically given targeted therapies as single and combination therapies, regional chemotherapies, and chemoembolization and radioembolization. How these new drugs are best indicated and how they should be combined, as well as combining them with standard surgical and ablative therapies, is the subject of intense current clinical trial activity. Furthermore, effective antiviral therapies have entered clinical practice and their effects on HCC incidence and biology are under intense study.
In order to present a spectrum of these current ideas and advances, this special edition aims to review some of the major trends in HCC understanding and the developments in clinical management. These are presented as (1) molecular pathogenesis and signalling pathways; (2) HCC epidemiology and prevention strategies; (3) loco-regional, surgical and ablative, systemic therapies. Some special issues are also addressed, such as the evolving roles of biopsy and liquid biopsy for monitoring HCC evolution in individual patients; the role of stable disease in HCC therapy evaluation; the reasons so many major recent clinical trials of promising agents have failed, and what is to be learned from them in terms of clinical trial design and our approaches to HCC management.
Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:
- Molecular pathogenesis
- Epidemiology and preventive approaches
- Surveillance and diagnosis
- Locoregional therapy for patients with hepatocellular carcinoma
- Surgical treatments for hepatocellular carcinoma
- Novel molecular treatments