Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most frequent primary liver cancer and the sixth most common malignant tumor in the world, with an incidence of 2–8% per year in patients with hepatic cirrhosis or chronic hepatitis. Despite surveillance schedules, it is sometimes diagnosed at an advanced stage, requiring complex therapeutic efforts with both locoregional and systemic treatments. Traditional radiological tools (computed tomography and magnetic resonance) are used for the post-treatment follow-up of HCC. The first follow-up imaging is performed at 4 weeks after resection or locoregional treatments, or after 3 months from the beginning of systemic therapies, and subsequently every 3 months for the first 2 years. For this reason, these radiological methods do not grant the possibility of an early distinction between good and poor therapeutic response. Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) and dynamic contrast-enhanced ultrasound (DCE-US) have gained the interest of several researchers for their potential role in the early assessment of response to locoregional treatments (chemoembolization) or antiangiogenic therapies in patients with advanced HCC. In fact, DCE-US, through a quantitative analysis performed by specific software, allows the construction of time–intensity curves, providing an evaluation of the parameters related to neoplastic tissue perfusion and its potential changes following therapies. It has the invaluable advantage of being easily repeatable, minimally invasive, and able to grant important evaluations regarding patients’ survival, essential for well-timed therapeutic changes in case of unsatisfying response, and eventual further treatment planning.
肝细胞癌（HCC）是最常见的原发性肝癌，也是全球第六大常见恶性肿瘤，在肝硬化或慢性肝炎患者中，其年发病率为2%至8%。尽管有监测计划，但有时仍会在晚期才被诊断出来，需要结合局部区域治疗和全身治疗进行复杂的治疗努力。传统的放射学工具（计算机断层扫描和磁共振成像）被用于HCC治疗后的随访。首次随访影像学检查在切除或局部区域治疗后4周进行，或在全身治疗开始后3个月进行，随后在头两年内每3个月进行一次。因此，这些放射学方法无法早期区分治疗反应良好与不良。对比增强超声（CEUS）和动态对比增强超声（DCE-US）因其在早期评估晚期HCC患者对局部区域治疗（化疗栓塞）或抗血管生成治疗的反应方面的潜在作用，引起了多位研究者的兴趣。事实上，DCE-US通过特定软件进行定量分析，能够构建时间-强度曲线，从而评估与肿瘤组织灌注相关的参数及其在治疗后可能发生的变化。它具有无可估量的优势：易于重复、微创，并且能够提供关于患者生存的重要评估，这对于在治疗反应不理想时及时调整治疗方案以及制定进一步的最终治疗计划至关重要。
肿瘤(癌症)患者之家