Hepatocellular Carcinoma Case Studies

Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) is a highly malignant tumor with a growing burden in the United States with increasing prevalence. It is the fifth most frequently diagnosed cancer and second highest in terms of mortality, with one million cancer deaths yearly. A variety of risk factors contribute to HCC, including hepatitis B viral (HBV) infection, chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, cirrhosis of any cause including environmental toxins, alcohol abuse, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, hereditary hemochromatosis or alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency among others. There has been significant increase in the rate of HBV- and HCV-related HCC[1]. Liver cirrhosis is the most important pre-malignant lesion of HCC, but HCC can occur in non-cirrhotic patients too, with the predominant risk factor being HBV infection[1]. In non-cirrhotic patients, occurrence of HCC is established to have been mostly because of HBV[2]. . …show more content…
In HCC, most frequently encountered metastatic sites are lungs(47%), lymph nodes(45%), bones(37%) and rarely adrenal glands(12%)[3]. Skeletal invasion in HCC is a rather less likely cause of distant metastases. However a recent survey[4] showed an increased incidence of bone metastases up to 25% over the last decade[5] involving the axial skeleton frequently. Although very uncommon, there are several other reported cases with a similar presentation[6]. However to our knowledge, spinal cord compression in HBV-related HCC was reported in only one other case report from