A Comparison for Liver Cancer Treatment Alternatives

Liver cancer is a mass that develops in the liver tissue due to uncontrolled cell division of the liver cells. Hepatocellular carcinoma is the commonest type of liver cancer, others include cholangiocarcinoma and angiosarcoma. Although this cancer type is rare, studies have shown that it has claimed so many lives. The causes of liver cancer are directly linked to diseases such as liver cirrhosis, hepatitis B and C. The major liver cancer therapy techniques are tumor ablation, tumor embolization, radiotherapy, surgery, chemotherapy, immunotherapy and targeted therapy. The choice of a particular therapy technique depends on certain disease-related factors such as the stage of the disease, it's severity, the extent of the damage, patient health status etc. However, other factors are related to the therapy technique and they greatly influence the choice of treatment option. This study focuses on the therapy-related factors which include survival rate, side effects, treatment duration, cost of treatment and comfortability. The various primary liver cancer therapy techniques were evaluated based on the above-listed factors using Fuzzy PROMETHEE decision-making theory. The ranking result showed that Tumor Ablation is the best treatment alternative for primary liver cancer upon selected criteria and weights based on desired application. The outcome of this study will benefit both the oncologist and the patients while trying to choose from a variety of alternatives in different scenarios.