Treatment of hepatic cancer by hepatic arterial infusion chemotherapy.

A group of 213 patients with advanced primary hepatic carcinomas and 353 patients with metastatic liver cancers were treated by the prolonged intra-arterial infusion of mitomycin C and 5-fluorouracil through a surgically placed catheter over a period of time from 1966 to 1987. Regionalized chemotherapy by hepatic arterial infusion for hepatic cancer produced a greater degree and higher incidence of response than are obtainable through systemic administration. Intra-arterial infusion chemotherapy seems to offer an exciting new avenue of approach to the control of hepatic cancer.