Rationale, definition, and history of transarterial chemoembolization

Transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) is a minimally invasive technique used for the treatment of liver’s malignancies, mostly hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). TACE allows administration of chemotherapy, carried in a mixture with Lipiodol (conventional TACE, C-TACE), or by drug-eluting beads (drug-eluting microsphere, DEM-TACE) [1], directly into the liver tumor’s feeding vessels [2, 3]. TACE has been used in palliative treatments and unresectable HCC since the beginning of this century