Background: The prognosis of many patients with distant metastatic hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) improved after they survived for several months. Compared with traditional survival analysis, conditional survival (CS) which takes into account changes in survival risk could be used to describe dynamic survival probabilities.

Aim: To evaluate CS of distant metastatic HCC patients.

Methods: Patients diagnosed with distant metastatic HCC between 2010 and 2015 were extracted from the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results database. Univariate and multivariate Cox regression analysis were used to identify risk factors for overall survival (OS), while competing risk model was used to identify risk factors for cancer-specific survival (CSS). Six-month CS was used to calculate the probability of survival for an additional 6 mo at a specific time after initial diagnosis, and standardized difference (d) was used to evaluate the survival differences between subgroups. Nomograms were constructed to predict CS.

Results: Positive α-fetoprotein expression, higher T stage (T3 and T4), N1 stage, non-primary site surgery, non-chemotherapy, non-radiotherapy, and lung metastasis were independent risk factors for actual OS and CSS through univariate and multivariate analysis. Actual survival rates decreased over time, while CS rates gradually increased. As for the 6-month CS, the survival difference caused by chemotherapy and radiotherapy gradually disappeared over time, and the survival difference caused by lung metastasis reversed. Moreover, the influence of age and gender on survival gradually appeared. Nomograms were fitted for patients who have lived for 2, 4 and 6 mo to predict 6-month conditional OS and CSS, respectively. The area under the curve (AUC) of nomograms for conditional OS decreased as time passed, and the AUC for conditional CSS gradually increased.

Conclusion: CS for distant metastatic HCC patients substantially increased over time. With dynamic risk factors, nomograms constructed at a specific time could predict more accurate survival rates.

Keywords: Conditional survival; Distant metastasis; Hepatocellular carcinoma; Nomogram; Prognosis.

©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.