Abstract:
Objective To investigate the safety and efficacy of immunologic and targeted drugs combined with hepatic arterial infusion chemotherapy (HAIC) for the treatment of advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).
Methods A total of 34 patients with advanced HCC were retrospectively analyzed; they were admitted to the Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute & Hospital between April 2021 and April 2022 for routine HAIC combined with sindilizumab and bevacizumab biosimilars. The treatment efficacy was assessed according to the mRECIST 1.1 criteria, with the first treatment as the starting point and patient death, disease progression, and intolerable adverse reactions as the endpoints. The patients were followed-up until April 2023. The primary endpoint was the objective response rate (ORR); the secondary endpoints were disease control rate (DCR), overall survival (OS), disease-free survival (DFS), surgical conversion rate, and safety.
Results The ORR was 52.9%, DCR was 85.3%, and surgical conversion rate was 41.1%. Significant differences were observed between patients in the partial response (PR) and stable disease (SD)+progressive disease (PD) groups, in terms of their 1-year OS (94.4% and 50.0%, respectively; P=0.002) and DFS (66.7% and 25.0%, respectively; P=0.013). Common adverse reactions included nausea and vomiting (38.2%), hypertension (32.4%), and thrombocytopenia (29.4%). No treatment-related deaths occurred.
Conclusions HAIC combined with sindilizumab and bevacizumab biosimilars for the treatment of advanced HCC showed a high objective remission rate and a favorable safety profile, demonstrating its suitability for subsequent prospective clinical trials.