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Commentary on the challenges of modeling hepatoblastoma in-vivo

Pediatric Research (2024)Cite this article

Hepatoblastoma is the most common primary liver cancer in the United States.1 The mainstay for treatment includes surgical resection, chemotherapy and in extreme cases liver transplantation, which collectively has lead to a greater than 80% overall survival rate.

Cornet et al. asks two related and very important questions: will resecting hepatoblastoma induce growth in residual tumor and in distant metastases? These questions have important translational implications. The majority of hepatoblastomas are surgically resected. While only a minority of hepatoblastomas are metastatic, the presence of distal disease is associated with a significant decrease in survival.2 To explore these questions, Cornet et al. employed some creative approaches that highlight an intrinsic challenge to pediatric cancer research. Studying pediatric tumors such as hepatoblastoma is very challenging given their rarity. The approaches that can be used to explore these questions in adult tumors are often not possible. For example, analyzing the role of resection on adult liver cancer can be studied using a prospective study of 139 patients from a single center.3 Just for perspective, that study included far more subjects than the total number of patients diagnosed with hepatoblastoma in the United States each year.

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Funding

This work was supported by a Pilot & Feasibility grant from the Pittsburgh Liver Research Center, NIH/NIDDK P30DK120531 (EHH).

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  1. Department of Pediatrics, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Edward H. Hurley

  2. Pittsburgh Liver Research Center, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Edward H. Hurley

  3. Division of Newborn Medicine, UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Edward H. Hurley

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Correspondence to Edward H. Hurley.

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Hurley, E.H. Commentary on the challenges of modeling hepatoblastoma in-vivo. Pediatr Res (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41390-024-03215-2

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