We found a borderline significance at the latest time points (T3, p = 0.057; T4, p = 0.095), suggesting that patients keeping high levels of plasmatic cfDNA while receiving systemic therapy might have a worse outcome (Fig. 4 ).
On the contrary, we did observe a difference between the concentrations of cfDNA in the presence or absence of metastases, which was significant ( p = 0.012) or borderline significant ( p = 0.073) at T1 and T2, respectively (Fig. 3 ).
On the contrary, quantitative analysis of post-operative cfDNA was always feasible and showed a trend with the clinical history of the patients, supporting the use of cfDNA to monitor therapy response also in advanced HCC.