Viral hepatitis-associated intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma shares common disease processes with hepatocellular carcinoma

Bile duct cells and hepatocytes differentiate from the same hepatic progenitor cells. To investigate the possible association of viral hepatitis B and C with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC), we conducted a retrospective case-control study using univariate and multivariate logistic analyses to identify risk factors for ICC. Besides hepatic lithiasis (25.6%; P < 0.001), seropositivity for hepatitis B surface antigen (37.5% of all ICC patients; odds ratio (OR) = 4.985, P < 0.001) and seropositivity for hepatitis C antibodies (13.1%; OR = 2.709; P = 0.021) are the primary independent risk factors for ICC. Cirrhosis exerted synergic effects on the development of ICC. We compared the age distributions of viral-hepatitis associated ICC to that of viral hepatitis-associated hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The mean age of ICC patients with viral hepatitis B (56.4 +/- 11.1 years) were 9 years younger than that of ICC patients with viral hepatitis C (65.6 +/- 9.17 years), similar to that observed in HCC. The incidence ratio of HCC: ICC : CHC (combined hepatocellular cholangiocarcinoma) in our population was 233 : 17 : 1 consistent with the theoretic ratio of hepatocyte number to cholangiocyte number in the liver. Our findings indicated that both viral hepatitis-associated ICC and HCC shared common disease process for carcinogenesis and, possibly, both arose from the hepatic progenitor cells. British Journal of Cancer (2009) 100, 1765-1770. doi: 10.1038/sj.bjc.6605063 www.bjcancer.com Published online 12 May 2009 (C) 2009 Cancer Research UK