Local therapy improvement of outcome in a patient with recurrent hepatocellular carcinoma after living donor liver transplantation: A case report

We describe a very rare case of recurrent hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) after living donor liver transplantation (LDLT). A 47-year-old female underwent LDLT for HCC within Milan criteria, receiving a left liver lobe from her 38-year-old husband with an incompatible blood type. Thirty months after LDLT, however, enhanced computed tomography (CT) showed a tumor in her left adrenal gland; after another six months, enhanced CT and positron-emission tomography detected a frontal head bone tumor; enhanced CT performed 54 months after LDLT revealed a recurrent HCC in the liver graft. Each of these three tumors was surgically resected. Two months after hepatic partial resection, an enhanced CT showed another HCC in her liver graft, which was treated with local ablation therapy. One year after the last ablation treatment, the recipient is doing well without evidence of recurrence. At the time of detection of each of these tumors, the patient's serum concentration of hepatitis B virus surface antigen was elevated. Pathological examination showed that the resected tumors were moderately differentiated HCCs. Genotyping by microsatellite analysis confirmed their origin to be metastases of the primary HCC.