Liver Cancer

Liver cancer is cancer that begins in the cells of your liver. Your liver is the largest organ inside your body. It is football-sized and sits in the upper right portion of your abdomen, beneath your diaphragm and above your stomach. It helps your body digest food, store energy, and remove toxins.

Not all cancers that affect the liver are considered liver cancer. Cancer that begins in another area of the body — such as the colon, lung or breast — and then spreads to the liver is called metastatic cancer rather than liver cancer.

Liver cancer is much more common in countries in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia than in the United States. Liver cancer occurs more often in men than in women. The average age at diagnosis of liver cancer is 63, and more than 95% of people diagnosed with liver cancer are 45 years of age or older.

You may not have symptoms until liver cancer is advanced, which makes it harder to treat. Treatment may include surgery to remove the liver or transplant a healthy liver, radiation therapy, or chemotherapy.

It is not clear exactly what causes liver cancer. In general, cancer occurs when cells in your liver develop errors (mutations) in their DNA. The errors make cells grow and divide out of control. The accumulating abnormal cells form a tumor in the liver that can grow to invade nearby structures and spread to other parts of the body.

Factors that increase your risk for primary liver cancer include:

• having hepatitis B or C
• heavy alcohol use
• having cirrhosis, or scarring of the liver
• having hemochromatosis, an iron storage disease
• being obese
• having diabetes

See your doctor for unexplained weight loss, loss of appetite, upper-abdominal pain, or yellowing of the skin or eyes (jaundice), especially with hepatitis or cirrhosis. Regular monitoring is advised if you are at higher risk.