Perspectives of Internists and Surgeons on Borderline Resectable Hepato-cellular Carcinoma: The Kanagawa Internists-Surgical Hepatocellular Carcinoma Treatment Collaboration Meeting Questionnaire

A 30-question questionnaire survey was administered to 45 full-time surgeons board-certified by the Japanese Society of Hepatobiliary Surgery and internists board-certified by the Japanese Society of Gastroenterol-ogy or the Japan Society of Hepatology practicing in Kanagawa Prefecture. Responses to questions on the criteria for liver resection and multidisciplinary treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma were collected from 69 par-ticipants, including 41 internists and 28 surgeons, from 28 centers. Regarding the decision for surgical hepatocel-lular carcinoma resection after medical treatment, except in the down stage, the internists focused on achieving complete response whereas the surgeons focused on achieving no recurrence for a certain duration. In patients responding to medical treatment, internists were more likely to continue medical treatment and only chose resection if the tumor shrank with a change in response from Vp4 to Vp2, which was lower than the surgeon’s resection selection rate. For multidisciplinary treatment, the recognition matching of both medical and surgical according to common criteria by the cancer board was important.