The optimal timing of radiotherapy for refractory choroidal hemangioma and its relationship with the curative effect / 中华放射肿瘤学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the relationship between the timing and the curative effect of radiotherapy in the treatment of refractory choroidal hemangioma.Methods Clinical data of 23 patients (23 eyes) who were diagnosed with refractory choroidal hemangioma from August 2005 to August 2016 and treated in our hospital were retrospectively analyzed.Routine fractional radiotherapy was performed.The total dose of routine radiotherapy was 24 Gy (3 Gy/8F) for 14 eyes,34 Gy (2 Gy/17F) for five eyes and 46 Gy (2 Gy/23F) for four eyes,respectively.Patients were divided into the low-and high-dose groups,early-and late-radiotherapy groups,and active-and expectant-treatment groups according to the total dose of radiotherapy,whether they received active-or expectant-treatment before radiotherapy,and whether the time interval between the incidence of initial symptoms and the time of receiving radiotherapy exceeded one year.The curative effect between two groups was statistically compared by Fisher's exact test.Results A total of 70％(16/23) of the affected eyes were cured at 6 months after radiotherapy.The effective rate in the diseased eyes receiving radiotherapy within 1 year after the onset of initial symptoms was significantly higher than that in those receiving radiotherapy over 1 year (P＜0.05),whereas no statistical significance was observed in the effective rate between the low-and high-dose groups,and between the active-and expectant-treatment groups (both P＞0.05).Conclusions Radiatherapy is a safe and effective treatment of refratory choroidal hemangioma.Early radiotherapy contributes to the recovery of visual acuity of the affected eyes.