Primary hepatic carcinoid tumors confirmed with long-term follow-up after resection

Abstract

Primary carcinoid tumor of the liver is very rare. Only 30 cases have been reported in the English literature. However, most of those cases were diagnosed only on the basis of diagnostic imaging and surgical exploration, their follow-up periods being up to 5 years. Considering the slow progression of the tumor, long-term follow-up is required to exclude occult extrahepatic primaries which may manifest afterwards, and to determine the clinical course of this disease. We experienced 3 patients with primary hepatic carcinoid tumors who underwent total resections. They all survived more than 7 years and were clinically confirmed as hepatic primary by failing to detect other primaries during their courses. One patient is disease-free for more than 7 years after resection. The other 2 were found to have recurrence in the remnant liver; 1 underwent transcatheter arterial embolization several times and is alive more than 4 years after recurrence, and the other underwent 2 more operations and survived 8 years after the 1st recurrence. Surgery might offer a possible chance of cure for primary hepatic carcinoid tumor, and transcatheter arterial embolization might be a good treatment option when an unresectable disease is confined to the liver.