Steve Waggoner

Late rectal sequelae following definitive radiation therapy for carcinoma of the uterine cervix: A dosimetric analysis☆

PURPOSE This study attempted to correlate patient, treatment, and dosimetric factors with the risk of late rectal sequelae in patients treated with radiation therapy (RT) for cervical carcinoma. METHODS AND MATERIALS A total of 183 patients with cervical carcinoma (67 Stage I, 93 Stage II, and 23 Stage III) treated with definitive RT with a minimum of 2 years follow-up were evaluated. Treatment consisted of external beam pelvic RT (EBRT) followed by intracavitary RT (ICRT) consisting of one or two insertions. Complications were scored and analyzed as a function of 25 patient and treatment factors. Conventional total rectal doses were obtained by adding together the EBRT and ICRT rectal doses. To account for differences in dose rate between the ICRT and EBRT, and variations in EBRT fractionation schemes, biologically equivalent rectal doses (BED) were calculated using a linear quadratic model. In addition, the influence of the varying proportions of EBRT and ICRT rectal doses were evaluated. RESULTS Twenty-eight patients (15.3%) developed late rectal sequelae (13 Grade 1, 3 Grade 2, and 12 Grade 3). Diabetes (p = 0.03), Point A dose (p = 0.04), and conventional EBRT dose (p = 0.03) were the most significant factors on multivariate analysis. Logistic regression analysis demonstrated a low risk (<10%) of late rectal sequelae below conventional and biological rectal doses of 75 Gy and 135 BED, respectively. The percentage of rectal dose delivered by the EBRT significantly influenced the dose-response relationship. A defined threshold percentage above which rectal sequelae were more common was identified over the range of doses evaluated. This threshold was 87% at a total rectal dose of 60 Gy and decreased to 60% at 80 Gy. CONCLUSION Diabetes, Point A, and EBRT doses are the most significant factors associated with the risk of late rectal sequelae in patients treated with RT for cervical carcinoma. The percentage of rectal dose delivered by the EBRT significantly affects the conventional and biological dose-response relationship. This suggests that the volume of rectum irradiated is an important and independent parameter in the development of late rectal sequelae.

Race and clinical outcome in endometrial carcinoma

OBJECTIVE To compare the outcomes of black and white women who have surgically staged endometrial carcinoma. METHODS We retrospectively compared the clinicopathologic factors, socioeconomic status, treatments, and outcomes of 70 black and 302 white women who were treated for surgically staged endometrial carcinoma at our institution. RESULTS Black women had higher-grade tumors, less favorable histologic findings, more comorbid illnesses, and lower socioeconomic indices. A nonsignificant trend was also seen toward more advanced-stage disease. The extent of surgical staging and types of adjuvant therapies were similar. On univariate analysis, black women had worse 5-year disease-free survival than white women (52.8% versus 75.2%; P = .001). Other significant factors included stage, grade, lymph node status, extension to the uterine serosa, cervical involvement, histology, adnexal involvement, lymphovascular invasion, myometrial invasion, positive peritoneal cytology, level of education, and household income. After controlling for pathologic and socioeconomic differences in multivariate analysis, race remained a significant prognostic factor (P = .008; hazard rate 2.0; 95% confidence interval 1.2, 3.5). CONCLUSION In a large cohort of surgically staged and uniformly treated patients with endometrial carcinoma, black race was associated with significantly worse outcomes, even after controlling for clinicopathologic and socioeconomic factors.

Surgery and postoperative radiation therapy in stage II endometrial carcinoma

The traditional approach to patients with stage II endometrial carcinoma is preoperative radiation therapy (RT) followed by surgery. Currently, many patients are treated with primary surgery and postoperative RT. We retrospectively reviewed the outcome of 44 stage II (32 IIA, 12 IIB) patients who underwent surgery and postoperative RT. Nine (20%) had microscopic cervical involvement noted before surgery, and 35 (80%) had occult involvement noted postoperatively. Postoperative RT consisted of whole pelvic RT (WPRT) (50%), vaginal brachytherapy (VB) (18%), or both (32%). At a median follow-up of 40 months, the 5-year actuarial disease-free survival was 72.4%. Two patients (4%) had recurrence in the pelvis (one vagina, one lateral pelvis). Eighteen stage IIA patients treated with WPRT alone and eight stage IIA patients, without deep myometrial invasion (MI), were treated with VB alone, and remained controlled in the pelvis. Extrapelvic recurrences occurred in 12 patients (25%), primarily in those with deep MI and/or grade 2-3 disease. Our results suggest that patients with stage II endometrial carcinoma with microscopic or occult cervical involvement treated with surgery and postoperative RT have a favorable outcome. A high rate of pelvic control is achieved with RT tailored to the pathologic findings.

Preoperative intracavitary brachytherapy in early-stage cervical carcinoma.

Local failure within the central pelvis is a common site of recurrence in patients with early stage cervical carcinoma who experience recurrence after radical hysterectomy and pelvic lymphadenectomy. To reduce the risk of local failure, the authors treated selected patients with early stage cervical carcinoma with a moderate dose (45 Gy) of preoperative intracavitary brachytherapy before radical hysterectomy and pelvic lymphadenectomy. Given the low risk of recurrence in patients with small (<2 cm) tumors, the authors included only patients with tumors 2 cm or more in size. Forty-three patients (37 with stage IB disease, six with stage IIA disease) were treated from 1986 through 1995. Forty-two completed intracavitary brachytherapy; intracavitary brachytherapy was stopped early in one patient secondary to a low-grade fever. Exploratory laparotomy and planned radical hysterectomy were performed 2 weeks later. Radical hysterectomy was aborted in patients found to have extrauterine disease. At a median follow-up of 45 months, only one local failure has been noted, which occurred in the patient unable to complete intracavitary brachytherapy as planned. The most significant factor correlated with poor outcome was nodal involvement (p < 0.0004). A trend to a better disease-free survival was seen in patients with no residual or only microscopically residual disease. No patients developed significant chronic bowel or bladder toxicity, including fistulae. The results suggest that preoperative intracavitary brachytherapy in selected patients with early stage cervical carcinoma is a promising approach and is associated with a high rate of local control without significant adverse sequelae. Further data is needed to determine whether this approach improves the long-term outcome of these patients.