Colorectal Liver Metastases Rarely Occur in Patients with Chronic Hepatitis Virus Infection

Abstract

BACKGROUND/AIMS: There are studies that report that liver metastases rarely occur in patients with cirrhosis. This study evaluates the relationship between the incidence of liver metastases from colorectal cancer (CRC) and chronic hepatitis virus infection in patients. METHODOLOGY: Three hundred and fifty-four cases of advanced CRC from our hospital were evaluated. The patients were divided into a chronic hepatitis virus infection group and a non-hepatitis virus infection group. The two groups were compared regarding the incidence of colorectal liver metastases and survival. The criterion of colorectal liver metastases was based on liver CT examination and intraoperative exploration results. RESULTS: There were two cases with colorectal liver metastases among the seventy cases of the chronic hepatitis virus infection group. The rate of liver metastases was 2.86%. There were 48 cases with colorectal liver metastases among 284 cases of the non-hepatitis virus infection. The rate of liver metastases was 16.9%. The incidence of colorectal liver metastases between the two groups was significantly different (p<0.01). Five-year survival rates were 60% and 40.8% in the chronic hepatitis virus infection group and the non-hepatitis virus infection group, respectively (p<0.05). The degree of progress in the two groups of patients showed no significant difference. CONCLUSIONS: Colorectal liver metastases occur rarely with chronic hepatitis virus infection and the patients in our study had good prognoses.