Cytokine-induced killer (CIK) cell therapy for patients with hepatocellular carcinoma: efficacy and safety

Abstract

Abstract Purpose To evaluate the efficacy of cytokine-induced killer (CIK) cell therapy in the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma. Materials and methods Randomized phase II and III trials on CIK cell-based therapy were identified by electronic searches using a combination of "hepatocellular carcinoma" and "cytokine-induced killer cells". Results The analysis showed significant survival benefit (one-year survival, p p p p p p +, CD4+, CD4+CD8+ and CD3+CD4+ T cells significantly increased in the CIK group, compared with the non-CIK group (p Conclusions CIK cell therapy demonstrated a significant superiority in prolonging the median overall survival, PFS, DCR, ORR and QoL of HCC patients. These results support further larger scale randomized controlled trials for HCC patients with or without the combination of other therapeutic methods.

Keywords

• Cytokine-induced killer cells
• Hepatocellular carcinoma
• Clinical trial
• Meta-analysis
• Therapy