Interferon therapy improves survival in patients with hepatitis B virus-related hepatocellular carcinoma after curative surgery: a meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND AND AIM: A novel study found interferon enhanced antitumor activity of anti-PD-1-based immunotherapy and played a crucial role in improving efficacy on HCC, but the opposite results about the efficacy of interferon on HBV-related HCC were obtained from previous clinical studies and meta-analyses. Thus, this meta-analysis aimed to re-evaluate whether interferon could improve survival and reduce recurrence of patients with HBV-related HCC after curative surgery. METHODS: MEDLINE/PubMed, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, Web of Science and CNKI were searched for eligible studies from inception to November 2022 and a meta-analysis was done. RESULTS: 10 trials with a total of 2062 subjects were screened. Interferon significantly improved 1-, 2-, 3- and 5-year OS and 1-, 2- and 3-year DFS, and reduced 2-, 3- and 5-year recurrence rates of patients with HBV-related HCC after curative surgery. However, interferon did not improve 8-year OS and 5-year DFS, did not reduce 1-year recurrence rate. CONCLUSIONS: Interferon may significantly reduce recurrence and improve DFS of patients with HBV-related HCC after curative surgery, and finally improve the OS. However, the efficacy advantage may gradually weaken as time goes on. The clinical application of interferon combined with NAs recommended in this meta-analysis is needed to be further studied.

Comparative serum microRNA array analysis of the spleen-stomach dampness-heat syndrome in different diseases: Chronic hepatitis B and chronic gastritis.

Spleen-stomach dampness-heat syndrome (SSDHS) is the common Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) syndrome observed in both chronic hepatitis B (CHB) and chronic gastritis (CG). The specialized TCM prescription for CHB and CG patients with SSDHS is same, but there is limited information about the biological characteristics of this TCM syndrome. This study aimed to identify the serum miRNAs profile for the SSDHS in two different diseases in order to evaluate the miRNA-mediated biological characteristics of this TCM syndrome. We performed comparative microarray analysis of serum miRNA expression profiles in 10 CHB patients with SSDHS (SSDHS-CHB), 10 CG patients with SSDHS (SSDHS-CG), and 10 healthy controls (HC). The selected miRNAs were further validated by qRT-PCR in 13 SSDHS-CHB patients, 13 SSDHS-CG patients, and 13 HC. Moreover, bioinformatics analysis (GO and KEGG pathway enrichment analyses) was applied to identify the involved target genes and pathways for these selected miRNAs. Nine significantly differentially expressed (SDE)-miRNAs in the SSDHS-CHB group and 24 SDE-miRNAs in the SSDHS-CG group were identified, compared with the HC group (fold change >2.0 and p < .05). Among these, upregulated hsa-miR-483-3p and downregulated hsa-miR-223-3p were identified as the common SDE-miRNAs for both SSDHS-CHB and SSDHS-CG groups. Bioinformatics analysis of the common SDE-miRNA's target genes showed their involvement in the regulation of inflammation, immune response, and tumorigenesis. SSDHS-specific hsa-miR-483-3p and hsa-miR-223-3p identified in this study indicated a relevance to the underlying biological basis of SSDHS, and may provide scientific basis for the application of same TCM prescription in CHB and CG.