Table 1.

Prognosis of HCC according to TAM identification and polarization. Immunohistochemical staining for CD68, CD86 (M1), or CD163 and CD206 (M2) is frequently used to quantify and classify TAMs [38, 41]. Expression of the used tissue markers was determined by immunohistochemical staining. Serum sCD163 levels were measured by ELISA. Defining TAMs as solely CD68+ cells gives contradictory prognostic results. When however TAMs are subdivided for location (intra- or peritumoral) and polarization (M1- or M2-like cells), a more distinct prognostic value can be attributed. Moreover, it becomes clear from the presented studies that the presence of M2-like oriented TAMs results in a poor prognostic outcome and intratumoral M1-like TAMs correlate with good prognosis.

Author	Number of patient samples	Type of sample	Marker	Definition	Prognosis
Li et al. [42]	101	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Ding et al. [43]	137	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Kuang et al. [11]	262	Peritumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Zhang et al. [44]	149	Peritumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Zhou et al. [45]	213	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Wu et al. [33]	71	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Minami et al. [46]	105	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Liao et al. [47]	387	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Not related
Dong et al. [48]	253	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Not related
Yeung et al. [49]	93	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Good
Yeung et al. [49]	93	Peritumoral	CD68+	TAM	Poor
Li et al. [50]	302	Intratumoral	CD68+	TAM	Good
Liao et al. [47]	387	Intratumoral	CD16+	M2-like	Poor
Waidmann et al. [51]	267	Serum	sCD163+	M2-like	Poor
Minami et al. [46]	105	Intratumoral	CD163+	M2-like	Poor
Yeung et al. [49]	93	Peritumoral	CD163+	M2-like	Poor
Dong et al. [48]	253	Intratumoral	CD206+	M2-like	Poor
Dong et al. [48]	253	Intratumoral	CD86+	M1-like	Good