Detection of disseminated tumour cells in blood and bone marrow samples of patients undergoing hepatic resection for metastasis of colorectal cancer

Abstract

Although the number of patients in this study is limited, the presence of disseminated tumour cells did not predict subsequent extrahepatic recurrence. The results strongly suggest that the presence of circulating tumour cells in peripheral blood may reflect transient shedding of tumour cells related to large tumour volume.