Hepatol Res
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The Japanese staging system that is generally used for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) (3rd edition) was considerably revised recently, especially T category. No study, however, has revealed how well the new classification (4th edition) works to stratify HCC patients at a pre-intervention stage. The purpose of this study is to assess the discriminatory value and predictive power of the 4th edition, and to compare its utility with the clinical utilities of the 3rd edition and the cancer of the liver Italian program (CLIP) score, as determined from 662 Japanese patients. ⋯ These findings indicate that the 4th edition has a higher stratification value than the 3rd edition. However, this benefit is due to the non-surgical patients, rather than to the surgical patients. If the 4th edition had an additional scoring system based on its original tumor staging and liver damage, it might be highly beneficial, although relative risk ratios of those should be analyzed.