This is a retrospective study of single-center cohorts that involves patients with HCC who underwent liver transplantation between January 2016 and 2021, who received livers preserved with Hypothermic Oxygenated Perfusion (HOPE) or Static Cold Storage (SCS) with a minum follow up of 12 months.

The gold standard treatment for Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) is Liver Transplantation (LT) but, despite its success, it maintains cancer recurrence rates of 16%. Ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) is considered a major determinant of the higher rate of HCC recurrence associated with transplantation from ECD donors and/or organs with ischemic damage. In this field, the treatment with Machines Perfusion (MP) of the liver has gained increasing attention in the transplant community as a useful tool to relieve IRI, test the hepatic function before transplantation and potentially reconditioning the marginal organs. The current study aims to show that Hypothermic Oxygenated Perfusion (HOPE) can protect recipients not only from IRI and post-transplant complications but also from tumour recurrence, which appears to be inevitably linked to the quality of the organ. This will be done through the comparison between a retrospective group of patients with HCC who have undergone LT with graft preserved by HOPE and a retrospective group of HCC recipients who received grafts preserved without perfusion, but with Static Cold Storage (SCS) technique.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Recipients aged 18 years or older with previous diagnosis of HCC, undergone Liver Transplantation at the Transplant Center of the IRCCS AOUBO between January 2016 and 2021
• Patients who have given informed consent to participate in the study

Exclusion Criteria:

• none

All HCC patients transplanted between January 2016 and 2021 who received liver grafts preserved with HOPE or SCS and minimum 12 months of follow-up will be included in the study. The diagnosis of HCC was confirmed in accordance with the recommendations of international guidelines issued during the period corresponding to the diagnosis. Of these patients, demographic data, clinical parameters, laboratory data and cancer parameters will be collected, including the number of tumors, size, maximum diameter, total tumor diameter, satellite nodules, microvascular invasion, the grade, classification and stage of the tumour. Donor characteristics and post-transplant clinical data of recipients will be collected too.