Open AccessAnterior Skull Base Sarcomas: Report of Characteristics and Outcomes at a Tertiary Care Cancer Center
Author(s) -
Stacey R. Long,
Panagiotis Asimakopoulos,
Marlena McGill,
Marc A. Cohen,
Snehal G. Patel,
Jatin P. Shah,
Ian Ganly
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
journal of neurological surgery. part b, skull base
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.488
H-Index - 42
eISSN - 2193-6331
pISSN - 2193-634X
DOI - 10.1055/s-0040-1722667
Subject(s) - tertiary care , center (category theory) , skull , medicine , cancer , base (topology) , sarcoma , surgery , pathology , chemistry , mathematical analysis , mathematics , crystallography
Objective This study was aimed to describe our institutional experience on characteristics and treatment outcomes of sinonasal sarcomas invading the anterior skull base. Design Present study is a retrospective review. Setting The study was conducted at an academic cancer care center. Participants Thirty-one patients with skull base sarcomas treated with primary surgery from 1979 to 2015 were identified for this study from a preexisting database. Main Outcome Measures Survival and recurrence outcomes using the Kaplan-Meier method were the focus areas of the study. Results The median age was 44 years (range: 13-69 years). Twenty patients were male (64.5%). Twenty-nine patients underwent open craniofacial resection (93.5%) and two patients underwent endoscopic resection (6.5%). The majority of tumors were staged pT4 (77.4%). The most common pathologies were leiomyosarcoma (19.4%), osteosarcoma (16.1%), and chondrosarcoma (12.9%). Of those with known margin status, 10 patients had positive/close margins (32.2%) and 16 patients had negative margins (51.6%). Most tumors were high grade (74.2%). Twenty-three patients (74.2%) received adjuvant radiation and four patients (12.9%) received adjuvant chemotherapy. There were nine postoperative complications (29%) including one mortality and three cerebrospinal fluid leaks. There were 10 local, 2 regional, and 5 distant recurrences over a median follow-up of 74 months (range: 1-300 months). The 5-year disease-specific survival (DSS) was 69.8%. The 5-year locoregional recurrence-free probability (RFP) was 63.2% and the 10-year distant RFP was 71.7%. The 5-year DSS for high grade tumors was 64.2 and 85.7% for low grade tumors ( p = 0.117). Conclusion This study contributes an updated analysis of anterior skull base sarcomas. Five-year DSS is approximately 70%. Analysis of survival outcomes based on grade, tumor size, and other factors is limited by small sample size and the rarity of these tumors.