Circulating tumor cells are an indicator for the administration of adjuvant transarterial chemoembolization in hepatocellular carcinoma: A single‐center, retrospective, propensity‐matched study

Abstract Background High rates of postoperative tumor recurrence contribute to poor outcome in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Here, we investigated whether circulating tumor cells (CTCs) status can predict the benefit of adjuvant transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE) in patients with HCC. Methods The retrospective study enrolled 344 HCC patients with preoperative CTCs analysis. Clinical outcomes including recurrence and survival were compared between those who received and who did not receive adjuvant TACE. Similar comparisons were made for patients stratified according to CTC status (CTC‐negative [CTC = 0], n = 123; CTC‐positive [CTC ≥ 1], n = 221). Propensity score matching (PSM) strategy was adopted to offset differences between two groups. Results In the study cohort as a whole or in CTC‐negative cohort, there were no observable differences in overall survival (OS) or time to recurrence (TTR) between TACE and control group (P > .05). In CTC‐positive patients, PSM generated 64 patient pairs, and patients with adjuvant TACE had significantly better clinical outcomes (OS: not reached vs 36.4 months, P