# Phase II study of the GPC3-derived peptide vaccine as an adjuvant therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma patients

Source: https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-gpc3-hcc-oncoimmunology-2016/  
OnCo record `paper-gpc3-hcc-oncoimmunology-2016` (Key paper). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Phase 2 or 3 results paper on GPC3 in Hepatocellular carcinoma, in Oncoimmunology (2016), one of the most cited Europe PMC records with GPC3 in its title.

## Summary

The recurrence rates of Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) are high, necessitating novel and effective adjuvant therapies. Therefore, we conducted a phase II study of glypican-3 (GPC3) peptide vaccine as an adjuvant therapy for HCC patients. Forty-one patients with initial HCC who had undergone surgery or radiofrequency ablation (RFA) were analyzed in this phase II, open-label, single-arm trial. Ten vaccinations were performed for 1 y after curative treatment. We also investigated case-control subjects, where selected patients treated surgically during the same period were analyzed. The expression of GPC3 in the available primary tumors was determined by immunohistochemical analysis. Six patients received RFA therapy while 35 received surgery. The recurrence rate tended to be lower in the 35 patients treated with surgery plus vaccination compared to 33 patients who underwent surgery alone (28.6% vs. 54.3% and 39.4% vs. 54.5% at 1 and 2 y, respectively; p = 0.346, 0.983). Twenty-five patients treated with surgery and vaccination had GPC3-positive tumors; the recurrence rate in this group was significantly lower compared to that in 21 GPC3-positive patients who received surgery only (24% vs. 48% and 52.4% vs. 61.9% at 1 and 2 y, respectively; p = 0.047, 0.387). The GPC3 peptide vaccine improved the 1-y recurrence rate in patients with GPC3-positive tumors. This study demonstrated that GPC3 expression by the primary tumor may be used as a biomarker in a putative larger randomized clinical trial to determine the efficacy of the GPC3-derived peptide vaccine.

Indexed on Europe PMC as PubMed record 27467945 (DOI 10.1080/2162402x.2015.1129483). Its title names GPC3 and its text names Hepatocellular carcinoma; PubMed types it as a clinical trial report (Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't, research-article). It was matched automatically to the idea "In vivo CAR-T against solid-tumour antigens" and no figure has been checked by an editor.

## Fields

- Kind: Key paper
- Last checked: 2026-09-22
- Tags: europepmc-ingest
- Journal: Oncoimmunology
- Year: 2016
- DOI: 10.1080/2162402x.2015.1129483
- Authors: Sawada Y, Yoshikawa T, Ofuji K, et al.
- What it means: One of the most cited trial reports Europe PMC returns for GPC3 in Hepatocellular carcinoma, so it is a natural first reading for anyone weighing the idea it is linked from. The record was linked automatically by title and abstract; read the abstract above and the paper itself before relying on any figure.
- Caveats: Matched by GPC3 in the title and Hepatocellular carcinoma in the title or abstract of the Europe PMC record; the summary reproduces the record's abstract and no figure has been verified against the full paper.; Chosen as a phase 2 or 3 report by the record's publication type or its own wording, not by reading the paper.

## Sources

- Oncoimmunology 2016: https://doi.org/10.1080/2162402x.2015.1129483
- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27467945/
- Europe PMC: https://europepmc.org/article/MED/27467945

## Connected records

- journals: [Oncoimmunology](https://onco.cc/journals/oncoimmunology/)
- ideas: [In vivo CAR-T against solid-tumour antigens](https://onco.cc/ideas/idea-in-vivo-car-solid/)

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