Prognostic Nomograms Stratify Survival of Patients with Hepatocellular Carcinoma Without Portal Vein Tumor Thrombosis After Curative Resection

Background. The prognosis of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) without portal vein tumor thrombosis (PVTT) after curative resection is at variance. We identified the risk factors of poor postoperative prognosis and consequently developed prognostic nomograms generating individual risk of death and recurrence for this subgroup of patients with HCC. Methods. The risk factors were identified and nomograms were developed based on a retrospective study of 734 patients in the primary cohort who underwent curative resection for HCC from 2010 to 2012. The predictive accuracy and discriminative ability of the nomograms were determined by concordance index (Cindex) and calibration curve and compared with traditional staging systems of HCC. The results were validated in an independent cohort of 349 patients operated at the same institution in 2007. Results. All of the independent factors for survival in multivariate analysis in the primary cohort were selected into the nomograms. The calibration curve for probability of survival showed good agreement between prediction by nomograms and actual observation. The C-indices of the nomograms for predicting overall survival and recurrence-free survival were 0.755 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.752-0.758) and 0.665 (95% CI, 0.662-0.668), respectively, which were statistically higher than the C-indices of other HCC prognostic models. The results were further confirmed in the validation cohort. Conclusion. The proposed nomograms resulted in more accurate prognostic prediction for patients with HCC without PVTT after curative resection.