hepatoblastoma
Hepatoblastoma is the most common liver tumor in children under five years of age. As a rule, such a tumor occurs in the first year of life and affects the right part of the liver, and having the appearance of several whitish-yellow nodes.
Reasons
No one can name the exact causes of the development of hepatoblastoma. Often, the tumor can manifest itself due to a hereditary predisposition to the formation of malignant tumors, for example, in diseases such as familial adenomatic polyposis, Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome, hemihypertrophy. It can also begin to develop already in the womb, for example, under the influence of genetic mutations, chemicals or a certain oncogene, uncontrolled proliferation of immature cells or during the development of embryonic tumors.
Hepatoblastoma can also develop in parallel with other childhood tumors, for example, with Williams’ tumor. The risk group for the development of hepatoblastoma includes children who have suffered during the first days of life, hepatitis, helminthic invasion, metabolic disorders, colon polyposis, type 1 glycogen disease. The tumor can develop if the mother massively used combined oral contraceptives or consumed alcohol during pregnancy and lactation. Children with hepatoblastoma do not develop cirrhosis of the liver.
Symptoms
The initial stage of the disease, as a rule, does not have pronounced symptoms, the symptoms begin to manifest themselves more clearly in later periods, at the beginning of the disease there may be only a slight malaise. Then the child is found to have a protrusion of the abdomen, its enlargement, pain syndrome and abundant compaction in the right hypochondrium. A little later, there is a complete loss of appetite, nausea, vomiting, signs of jaundice with febrile temperature. If the baby begins to lose weight, it means that the tumor process has gone quite far. Sometimes premature puberty may occur with hepatoblastoma. Hepoblastoma refers to fast-growing tumors. There is also a high chance of hepatoblastoma metastasis to the bones, abdominal cavity, lungs and brain.
Diagnostics
There is no special method of diagnosing this disease. Palpation of the patient’s abdomen already makes it possible to determine the presence of an education in it. In addition, ultrasound of the abdominal cavity and liver are prescribed, it helps to identify the exact location of the tumor, the degree of its development, the presence or absence of nodes, lesions of the inferior vena cava, hepatic vessels. MRI, CT and other studies allow you to determine the stage of the disease and plan the scope of the operation.
Radiography will allow you to determine whether other organs are affected, will reveal the presence or absence of calcifications and other harmful substances in the central tumor, and will also exclude other neoplasms.
Hepatoblastoma can manifest itself in the form of anemia, increased ESR, leukocytosis, thrombocytosis and elevated levels of ACE and cholesterol. These changes are easy to notice in the blood tests of the child.
Treatment
Hepatoblastoma is treated surgically, the tumor is simply removed by partial hepatectomy. At the same time, one or more lobes of the liver that were affected by the tumor are removed. In more severe cases, preoperative chemotherapy is used to reduce the size of the tumor. For children, chemotherapy is indicated not only before, but also after surgery to destroy under-removed tumor cells. Radiation therapy is rarely used and mainly for pain relief. In some, especially severe cases, liver transplantation may be used.
