Rachel Lee, MD, MSPH, a surgical resident on research sabbatical under the mentorship of surgical oncologists Maria Russell, MD, and Shishir Maithel, MD, won the Best Visual Abstract Award at the 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting of the Southeastern Surgical Congress. The illustration accompanied her podium presentation of "The evolving landscape of hepatocellular carcinoma: A United States safety net collaborative analysis of etiology of cirrhosis.”
In the study, Dr. Lee and her co-authors, who included Drs. Maithel and Russell and fellow sabbatical resident Adriana Gamboa, MD, aimed to determine the impact of cirrhosis etiology on overall survival in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).
The study was instigated by the fact that cirrhosis due to alcohol and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is set to surpass Hepatitis C (HCV) causality for HCC.
Dr. Lee and the team found that alcohol-related cirrhosis is associated with all clinicopathologic factors that correlate with decreased survival from HCC, regardless of whether treated at a safety-net hospital or quaternary referral center. The team concluded that efforts must focus on this especially vulnerable patient population to optimize screening, treatment, and outcomes.