Patterns of failure following treatment for glioblastoma multiforme and anaplastic astrocytoma. Academic Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • Recurrence patterns of glioblastoma multiforme (25) and anaplastic astrocytoma (9) were studied using CT scans of 34 patients who received all or a portion of their surgical treatment at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center from January 1983 through February 1987. Thirty-two patients presented with unifocal tumors and two with multifocal tumors. All patients received radiation therapy following initial surgery. Eighteen patients who underwent re-operation following CT evidence of recurrence had histologic verification of recurrent tumor; sixteen patients had radiographic evidence of recurrence only. Seventy-eight percent (25/32) of unifocal tumors recurred within 2.0 cm of the pre-surgical, initial tumor margin, defined as the enhancing edge of the tumor on CT scan. Fifty-six percent (18/32) of tumors recurred within 1.0 cm of the initial tumor margin. Tumors for which a gross total resection was accomplished tended to recur closer to the initial tumor margin than did subtotally resected tumors (p greater than 0.1). Extensive pre-operative edema was associated with a decreased distance between initial and recurrent tumor margins. Large tumors were generally not more likely to recur further from the initial tumor margin than were smaller tumors. No unifocal tumor recurred as a multifocal tumor. Only one tumor (initially near the midline) recurred in the contralateral hemisphere. The findings support the use of partial brain irradiation for post-operative treatment of glioblastoma multiforme and anaplastic astrocytomas, and may help to determine the most appropriate treatment volume for interstitial irradiation.

publication date

  • June 1, 1989

Research

keywords

  • Astrocytoma
  • Brain Neoplasms
  • Glioblastoma
  • Neoplasm Recurrence, Local

Identity

Scopus Document Identifier

  • 0024376302

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

  • 10.1016/0360-3016(89)90941-3

PubMed ID

  • 2542195

Additional Document Info

volume

  • 16

issue

  • 6