Peritoneal lavage with distilled water during liver resection in patients with spontaneously ruptured hepatocellular carcinomas.

Spontaneously rupture of hepatocellular carcinoma is a life threatening and worse prognosis. Not only the lower rate of resection and hemodynamic unstable, but also the hepatic failure and recurrence. Distilled water irrigation had been applied in several cancer surgeries including colon, stomach, breast, ovary, and bladder; thus had good results in lowering the tumor spreading. We applied distilled water peritoneal lavage after liver resection in patients with spontaneous rupture of hepatocellular carcinoma to define the influence of prognosis. Thirteen patients with spontaneous ruptured hepatocellular carcinoma underwent distilled water peritoneal lavage after curative liver resection (Group A). Nineteen patients with spontaneous ruptured hepatocellular carcinoma did not undergo distilled water peritoneal lavage after curative liver resection (Group B). There were 11 patients of tumor recurrence in Group B; 2 in Group A. The mean disease-free time of Group B was 2.05 +/- 0.74 years; for Group A it was 3.59 +/- 0.60 (P = 0.045). Peritoneal lavage in this series resulted in significantly better survival time for the patients in Group A (P = 0.0158). That implies distilled water peritoneal lavage during liver resection would retard the tumor recurrence and further improve the survival rate in patients with spontaneously ruptured hepatocellular carcinoma.