The study conducted by a group of researchers from the University of Hong Kong (HKU) has provided insight into the mechanism behind hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patient’s resistance to the programmed death 1 (PD-1) immune checkpoint blockade (ICB), contributing to the understanding of HCC therapy

In general, the prognosis for liver cancer is poor because patients are often diagnosed with liver cancer in advanced stage, while its cancer cells can still survive in hypoxia.^1,2 In a recent study conducted by Wong CL and colleagues from the Department of Pathology, School of Clinical Medicine, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, the University of Hong Kong, published in Nature Communications, it was found that hypoxia-induced macropinocytosis is a new metabolic mechanism in liver cancer cells, by which causing the engulfment of extracellular fluid and the subsequent protein digestion to support the unlimited growth of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).¹ The breakthrough discovery indicates that inhibiting hypoxia-induced macropinocytosis could be a novel and effective therapeutic approach for HCC.¹ This study could also be applied to other solid cancer types with hypoxia.¹

The global incidence of Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been rising.¹ In the meantime, treatment with atezolizumab (ATEZO) plus bevacizumab (BEV) has gained approval in more than 70 countries for unresectable HCC patients who have not received prior systemic therapies.² Evidence has shown that the combination of ATEZO and BEV significantly improved the overall survival (OS) and the progression-free survival (PFS).³ From the previous primary analysis of IMbrave150, ATEZO plus BEV successfully prolonged the survival safely in unresectable HCC.⁴ The recent update of IMbrave150 reported on the efficacy and safety of ATEZO plus BEV in patients with prior locoregional therapies (LRTs).

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the sixth most common cancer worldwide and accounts for approximately 5.7% of all new cancer cases annually.1 In Hong Kong, HCC is the fourth and seventh most common cancer in men and women, respectively, and is the third leading cause of cancer-related death.2 In a

Compared to patients without hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, those with HCV are associated with a 15 to 20-fold increase in risk of developing hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) as well as being the most common reason for liver transplantation in Europe and the United States (US).1,2 Prior to 2011, H

Fatty liver encompasses broad spectrum of conditions that lead to accumulation of fat in the liver. In Asia, the prevalence of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and its subsets are increasing due to altered dietary habits and lifestyle factors.¹

Chronic Hepatitis B Virus (HBV) infection is a global public health challenge in the same scale as tuberculosis, HIV, or malaria.¹ Globally, HBV infection causes considerable amount of liver-related morbidity and mortality. In Hong Kong, 7.8% of the population suffers from HBV infection,