The Liver Cancer Program uses surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, or gene therapy to treat liver cancers. The Program also offers newly developed treatments, including techniques that allow surgeons to operate with smaller incisions, thus decreasing post-operative pain and shortening hospital stays.
The most definitive treatment for liver cancer is surgical excision. Up to 75% of the liver can be removed provided the remaining 25% of the liver is normal (non-cirrhotic). Although some cancers occur throughout the liver and surgery is not an option, our team has extensive experience with challenging cases and surgical resection is always the first consideration. All of this is done in the Liver Cancer Program, by the surgeons of the Liver Transplant Division of the Thomas E. Starzl Transplant Institute.
Many cases of hepatocellular carcinoma, however, cannot be resected and are too advanced for transplantation. For those patients with essentially normal liver function, the best treatment is regional liver therapy. This is the main form of medical treatment offered by the Liver Cancer Program.
Regional therapy for liver cancer includes ethanol injection, gene therapy, radiofrequency ablation, Yttrium-90 (selective internal radiation therapy or SIRT) and chemoembolization. Systemic chemotherapy is also an option and is administered in collaboration with the Department of Medical Oncology at UPMC.
The Liver Cancer Program also serves as a funneling mechanism to direct patients to additional specialist care, such as liver transplantation. The Thomas E. Starzl Transplantation Institute is the world's largest transplant hospital and our Liver Cancer Program is a result of this international prominence and history.
