Effect of postoperative adjuvant radiotherapy on treatment outcome of patients with localized soft tissue sarcoma / 中华放射肿瘤学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the treatment outcome of patients with localized soft tissue sarcoma (STS) and related prognostic factors,with a focus of the role of postoperative radiotherapy in the treatment of STS.Methods A retrospective analysis was performed for the clinical data of 203 STS patients who underwent organ preservation surgery in Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center from July 2000 to July 2010.Of all the patients,76(37.4％) received adjuvant radiotherapy,which was delivered via anterior-posterior parallel opposed fields at a dose of 45-70 Gy.The Kaplan-Meier method was used to calculate survival rates,the log-rank test was used for survival difference analysis,and the Cox proportional hazards model was used for multivariate analysis.Results The follow-up rate was 100％.The 5-year overall survival (OS) rate,local failure-free survival rate,and distant metastasis-free survival rate were 69.1％,69.2％,and 68.0％,respectively.The multivariate analysis showed that pathological subtype,tumor size,resection margin status,and postoperative radiotherapy were influencing factors for OS.Among these factors,postoperative radiotherapy was associated with a significantly reduced risk of local recurrence in STS patients (HR=0.327,95％ CI 0.177-0.605,P=0.000) and a significantly increased OS rate (HR=0.489,95％ CI 0.266-0.897,P=0.021).Conclusions Postoperative radiotherapy can reduce local recurrence and improve OS in patients with localized STS,and further studies are needed to clarify its role.