Lymph node sampling in resectable hepatocellular carcinoma: national practice patterns and predictors of positive lymph nodes

Routine lymphadenectomy (LND) for resectable hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains controversial. We evaluated national LND trends to identify pre-operative factors associated with node-positive disease to determine which patients might benefit from LND.We identified HCC patients in the National Cancer Database (NCDB) treated with surgical resection between 2004 and 2015. Demographic, operative, pathologic, and survival data were compared....