CLINICAL-FEATURES OF HEPATOCELLULAR-CARCINOMA IN THE ELDERLY - A STUDY OF 91 PATIENTS OLDER THAN 70 YEARS

In order determine the clinical features of hepatocellular carcinoma i n the elderly, a total of 622 patients with hepatocellular carcinoma, including 91 patients 70 years or older, were retrospectively analysed with reference to their ages at the time of diagnosis. The proportion of females increased and that of hepatitis B surface antigen-positive cases decreased as age increased. Tumour sizes at the time of diagnos is were somewhat smaller in the elderly than in younger patients, wher eas clinical stage taking liver function into consideration was simila r in the two age groups. The prognosis in the elderly patients was sim ilar to that in the younger ones in a clinical stage-matched compariso n. Furthermore, by a multivariate analysis using the Cox proportional hazards model with inclusion of age and other clinical parameters, age was not selected in the final model as an independent predictor for s urvival. These results indicate that elderly patients with hepatocellu lar carcinoma have certain clinical features different from those in y ounger patients and that their prognosis is not necessarily poorer tha n in the latter.