Palliative care for hepatocellular carcinoma: Analysis of the National Cancer Data Base.

390 Background: Palliative care is provided to a subset of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients with the aim of symptomatic relief and improving quality of life. The present study sought to assess and compare the prevalence and efficacy of different palliative therapies for HCC from the National Cancer Database (NCDB). Methods: The NCDB, a retrospective national database that captures approximately 70% of all patients treated for cancer, was queried for patients with HCC who were deemed non-resectable from 1998-2011. Patients were stratified by receipt of palliative care. Descriptive analyses were performed. Survival analysis was examined by log-rank test and Kaplan Meier curves, and a multivariate proportional hazards model was utilized to identify the predictors of survival. Results: A total of 3,267 patients were identified; 287 (8.7%) received surgical palliation, 827 (25.3%) received radiotherapy, 877 (26.8%) received chemotherapy, 1,067 (32.6%) received pain therapy, while 209 (6.4%) received a c...