BALTIMORE – New research from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York could help surgeons better determine which patients with soft tissue sarcoma may benefit most from pulmonary metastasectomy.
The results of the research, presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery, suggest that preoperative factors such as primary tumor histology and size, number of metastases, time from initial resection of the primary, absence of extrapulmonary disease, and thoracoscopic resection are associated with improved survival in STS patients.
Dr. Garrett L. Walsh, professor of surgery at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, and a discussant on the paper at the meeting, said the study was important because it showed the power of a prospective surgical database, retrospectively viewed in this particular case. He said that the Sloan Kettering research was likely “as good as it’s going to get,” given that a randomized controlled trial is unlikely ever to occur with STS patients.
“Trying to select the patients we think are going to do well with surgery has always been one of the challenging aspects of thoracic surgery,” Dr. Walsh said in a video interview. “This paper may help with better selection of patients from that large cohort who are referred to us for pulmonary metastasectomy.”
Dr. Walsh reported no relevant financial disclosures.
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