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Page 10 of 11 Yoneoka et al. Hepatoma Res 2020;6:67 I http://dx.doi.org/10.20517/2394-5079.2020.57

Despite these limitations, the results of this study suggest that the pre-treatment NLR may predict response
to TARE as primary treatment for HCC. Furthermore, the pre-treatment NLR may also have better
prognostic value than the pre-treatment PLR or ALBI grade in predicting tumor response to therapy.
These findings may help clinicians identify patients who are expected to respond poorly to TARE prior
to treatment and enable them to consider additional or alternative therapies. However, future studies that
examine NLR and PLR in a larger cohort prospectively will be necessary to draw definitive conclusions
about the prognostic capabilities of these two inflammation-based markers.

DECLARATIONS
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank the interventional radiology group, Pacific Endovascular, for its services.
Additionally, we would like to thank Dr. Anthony Herrera and Dr. Chuong Nguyen for their guidance and
assistance with the concept design and instruction on review of images.

Authors’ contributions
Drafting of manuscript: Yoneoka G
Data collection: Yoneoka G, Bozhilov K, Wong LL
Data analysis: Yoneoka G, Wong LL
Critical review of manuscript: Bozhilov K, Wong LL
Conception: Wong LL

Availability of data and materials
Data inquiries may be forwarded to the corresponding author.

Financial support and sponsorship
This study was partially supported by National Institutes of Health (1U01CA230690-01).

Conflicts of interest
Mr. Grant Yoneoka and Dr. Kliment Bozhilov declared that there are no conflicts of interest. Dr. Linda
Wong is on the Speakers Bureau for Eisai.

Ethical approval and consent to participate
This study was approved by the Institutional Review Board at the Queen’s Medical Center and was
determined to be exempt from needing informed consent.

Consent for publication
Not applicable.

Copyright
© The Author(s) 2020.

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