Is human hepatocellular carcinoma a hormone-responsive tumor?

Table 1 Expression of estrogen receptors, progesterone receptors and androgen receptors in HCC

Study	Number of cases	Ethnicity	ER (%)	PgR (%)	AR (%)
Nagasue[11]	30	Japanese	40	NA	NA
Ohnishi[12]	8	Japanese	14	NA	50
Hamazaki[13]	22	Japanese	23	NA	19
Nagasue[14]	19	Japanese women	37	NA	37
Boix[15]	26	Western	15	0	54
Ng[16]	71	Chinese	24	14	NA
Jonas[17]	33	Western	39	18	NA
Liu[18]	66	Chinese	27	30	NA
Vizoso[19]	31	Western	52	84	68

ER: Estrogen receptors; PgR: Progesterone receptors; AR: Androgen receptors; NA: Not available.

Table 2 Randomized clinical trials testing the efficacy of tamoxifen in HCC

Study characteristics						Enclosed in meta-analysis
Reference	Patients	Tamoxifen arm		Comparator		Simonetti	Mathurin	Llovet	Cochrane
		Treatment	Overall survival	Treatment	Overall survival
Melia, 1987[22]	59	Adriamycin 60 mg/m2 + tam 20 mg/d	Median: 6 wk	Adriamycin 60 mg/m2	Median: 8 wk	X	X		X
Farinati, 1990[23]	38	Tam 30 mg/d	Median: 36 wk	No treatment	Median: 8 wk	X
Uchino, 1993[24]	26	Cisplatin, adriamycin, 5-fluorouracil + Tam 25 mg/m2 per d + MPA 400 mg/m2 per d	1-yr: 44.5%	Cisplatin, adriamycin, 5-fluorouracil	1-yr: 33.0%	X	X
Elba, 1994[25]	22	Tam 60 mg/d	Median: 74 wk	Placebo	Median: 52 wk	X	X	X	X
Martinez Cerezo, 1994[26]	36	Tam 20 mg/d	Median: 261 d	Symptomatic treatment	Median: 172 d	X	X	X	X
Castells, 1995[27]	120	Tam 20 mg/d	1-yr: 51%	Placebo	1-yr: 43%	X	X	X	X
Coll, 1995[28]	61	Tam 20 mg/d	1-yr: 24%	Placebo	1-yr: 25%		X		X
Manesis, 1995[29]	85	Tam 30 mg/d + triptorelin	Median: 282 d	Placebo	Median: 127 d	X	X	X
				Flutamide 750 mg/d + triptorelin	Median: 112 d
Riestra, 1998[30]	77	Tam 40 mg/d	1-yr: 30%	Placebo	1-yr: 37.8%			X	X
CLIP group, 1998[31]	496	Tam 40 mg/d	Median: 15 mo	No treatment	Median: 16 mo			X	X
Liu, 2000[18]	119	Tam 30 mg/d	Median: 44 d	Placebo	Median: 41 d			X	X
Chow, 2002[32]	329	Tam 60 mg/d	3 mo: 41%	Placebo	3-mo: 44%				X
		Tam 120 mg/d	3 mo: 35%
Barbare, 2005[33]	420	Tam 20 mg/d	Median: 4.8 mo	Symptomatic treatment	Median: 4.0 mo

Tam: Tamoxifen; MPA: Medroxyprogesterone acetate.