Abstract
Guidelines recommend biannual surveillance for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in hepatitis C individuals with cirrhosis if the HCC incidence rate is above 1.5 per 100 person-years (PY). However, the incidence threshold for surveillance in individuals who achieve a virological cure is unknown. We estimated the HCC incidence rate above which routine HCC surveillance is cost-effective in this growing population of virologically-cured hepatitis C individuals with cirrhosis or advanced fibrosis.
We developed a Markov-based microsimulation model of the natural history of HCC in individuals with hepatitis C who achieved virological cure with oral direct-acting antivirals. We used published data on the natural history of hepatitis C, competing risk post virological cure, HCC tumor progression, real-world HCC surveillance adherence, contemporary HCC treatment options and associated costs, and utilities of different health states. We estimated the HCC incidence above which biannual HCC surveillance using ultrasound and alpha-fetoprotein would be cost-effective.
In virologically-cured hepatitis C individuals with cirrhosis or advanced fibrosis, HCC surveillance is cost-effective if HCC incidence exceeds 0.7 per 100-PY using $100,000 per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) willingness-to-pay. At this HCC incidence, routine HCC surveillance would result in 2,650 and 5,700 additional life-years per 100,000 cirrhosis and advanced fibrosis persons, respectively, compared to no surveillance. At $150,000 willingness-to-pay, surveillance is cost-effective if HCC incidence exceeds 0.4 per 100-PY. Sensitivity analysis showed that the threshold mostly remained below 1.5 per 100-PY.
The contemporary HCC incidence threshold is much lower than the previous 1.5% incidence value used to guide HCC surveillance decisions. Updating clinical guidelines could improve the early diagnosis of HCC.
