J.Jpn. Surg. Soc.. 88(4): 453-459, 1987
Original article
EARLY DETERMINATION OF THE EFFECT OF PREOPERATIVE TAE BY OBSERVATION OF SERUM AFP CHANGES IN PATIENTS OF HEPATOCELLULAR CARCINOMA
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Second Department of Surgery, Nagasaki University School of Medicine, Nagasaki, Japan Tsutomu Tomioka, Ryoichi Tsuchiya, Noboru Harada, Tsukasa Tsunoda, Kunihide Izawa, Takashi Yamaguchi, Kensuke Yamamoto |
Changes in AFP level after TAE showed five typical patterns : 1) AFP continued to rise in spite of treatment (non-effective type) ; 2) AFP shows regular and equal increases and decreases (undulating type) ; 3) AFP showed an increase after initially decreasing (increasing after decreasing type) ; 4) AFP decreased gradually to normal levels (gradually decreasing type) ; and 5) AFP decreased along a half-value period line to normal levels (half-value period type).
These AFP patterns were intimately related to necrosis rate of tumor and other factors such as tumor size and existence of daughter tumors.
Even when the AFP level decreased to 1/2 one week after TAE, the tumor showed only about 70％ necrosis. Only when the AFP level fell into 1/4 of the original level after one week we could expect complete necrosis.
Immuno-histological findings revealed AFP-producing cells in carcinoma but not in necrotic cells. It seems therefore, that the immuno-histological technique is uneffective in determining the viability of tumor cells.
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