ArticleFrontiers in oncology2026
Correlation between circulating tumor cell levels and tumor response in patients with advanced hepatocellular carcinoma undergoing immunotherapy and molecular targeted therapy.
Article in Frontiers in oncology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are closely associated with the progression of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, the clinical value of CTC detection in patients receiving systemic therapy for advanced HCC remains to be fully elucidated. A total of 125 patients with advanced HCC who underwent systemic therapy were enrolled in this study. Five milliliters of peripheral blood were collected at five time points: before treatment initiation, and 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and 1 year after treatment. CTCs were isolated and captured using the Isolation by Size of Epithelial Tumor Cells (ISET) method. Tumor response to systemic treatment was evaluated according to the modified Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (mRECIST). We further analyzed the correlation between dynamic changes in peripheral blood CTC levels and tumor response to systemic therapy. The overall objective response rate (ORR) and disease control rate (DCR) were 39.2% (49/125) and 82.4% (103/125), respectively. Dynamic monitoring of CTCs revealed that CTC levels remained persistently high and gradually increased in patients with progressive disease (PD). In patients with complete response (CR) or partial response (PR), CTC levels decreased progressively during treatment and stayed at low levels thereafter. For patients with stable disease (SD), CTC counts began to decline 3 months after treatment but remained higher than those in patients with CR or PR. Baseline CTC levels were negatively correlated with treatment efficacy: patients with higher baseline CTC counts exhibited poorer tumor responses. Patients with baseline CTC counts < 15, CTC counts < 13 at 1 month post-treatment, and CTC counts < 10 at 3 months post-treatment were more likely to achieve an objective tumor response and obtained better therapeutic outcomes. Additionally, these patients had significantly longer progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) compared with those who exceeded the above cut-off values. Peripheral blood CTC counts are correlated with tumor treatment response in patients with advanced HCC. Serial CTC detection serves as a valuable tool for evaluating the efficacy of systemic therapy in advanced HCC.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.