Pathological versus clinical staging for children with hodgkin's disease comparison of long-term results

ABSTRACT

This work studied 358 children with pathologically proven diagnosis of Hodgkin's disease. They were either pathologically staged [149 patients] or clinically staged [209 patients]. The characteristics of both groups were comparable with minor differences. Both groups were treated either with involved field radiation therapy alone, chemotherapy alone or combined chemoradiotherapy. Complete response rates were identical in both pathologically and clinically staged groups [90%]. The 10-year overall survival [OS] rates were comparable [88% vs 83%] and the 10-year disease-free survival [DFS] rates were also comparable [52% vs 51%]. The prognostic factors for all patients that determined both DFS and OS were tumor stage, systemic manifestations, mediastinal involvement and type of treatment adopted