Oncological outcome of patients with deeply located soft tissue sarcoma of the pelvis: A follow up study at minimum 5 years after diagnosis

Aims

The treatment of pelvic soft tissue sarcomas (STS) presents one of the most challenging problems in musculoskeletal oncology because of the complex anatomy of the pelvis, late diagnosis and large tumor size. Our study was designed to determine the outcome and prognostic factors for survival and local recurrence in patients with pelvic STS located deep to the fascia and deemed suitable for curative surgical treatment.

Patients and methods

Ninety consecutive pelvic STS patients with at least 5-year possible follow-up from diagnosis were studied. Mean age at diagnosis was 54 years. Mean follow-up and tumor size were 69 months and 13 cm, respectively. Histological grades were grade 3 in 51, grade 2 in 22 and grade 1 in 17 patients. Tumor locations were extra-pelvic or outside pelvic brim (n = 67), intra-pelvic or within pelvic brim (n = 10), and combined or involving both outside and within pelvic brim (n = 13).

Result

Surgical treatment was excision in 84 patients and hindquarter amputation in 6 patients. In 84 patients who underwent excision, surgical margin was wide in 21 patients, marginal in 33, and intralesional in 30. Radiotherapy was used for all high grade tumors. Disease-specific survival was 53.3% at 5 years. Local recurrence occurred in 23%. Development of local recurrence was related to surgical margin (p = 0.03). Local recurrence, tumor histological grade and metastasis at diagnosis independently influenced disease-specific survival (p = 0.0008, p < 0.0001, p = 0.02, respectively).

Conclusion

The patients with high grade tumors and positive surgical margins represent a particular group with high risk of local recurrence even with radiotherapy.     

Use of tissue expander in pelvic Ewing's sarcoma treated with radiotherapy

Introduction

The local treatment option for pelvic Ewing sarcoma (ES) remains uncertain and challenging as surgery is often disabling while radiotherapy alone has a higher risk of local recurrence but not necessarily a worse survival. The aim is to analyse the outcome of patients with pelvic ES after radiotherapy as the primary local treatment in combination with a temporary intrapelvic surgically placed tissue expander (TE) to reduce bowel complications.

Materials and methods

20 patients were retrospectively analysed. All patients had neoadjuvant and adjuvant chemotherapy. We identified survival, time to develop local recurrence and metastasis, dose of radiotherapy administered, local complications related to the use of the tissue expander and bowel effects of radiotherapy.

Results

The median follow-up was 41 months. 14 patients were stage IIb and six stage III. There were no problems after insertion of the TE and only one patient who developed mild diarrhoea. Local recurrence occurred in six patients. At the last follow-up 12 patients have died from sarcoma, five are disease free and three have had recurrent disease.

Conclusions

In this paper we reviewed pelvic Ewing sarcoma with all the special considerations that this entails. We think that tissue expander can be safely used when radiotherapy is chosen to treat pelvic ES. It does appear to prevent bowel problems and is a low morbidity procedure. New treatment approaches should be considered to give a chance of cure to those patients with “bad prognostic” pelvic ES.     

Diaphyseal osteosarcomas have distinct clinical features from metaphyseal osteosarcomas

Aims

The aim of this study was to clarify the clinical features and outcomes of diaphyseal osteosarcoma.

Methods

Patients with newly-diagnosed high-grade osteosarcoma occurring in the long bone were eligible for this retrospective study. Clinicopathological information was collected from our database and compared with 36 diaphyseal, 405 proximal and 519 distal metaphyseal, and 14 whole bone osteosarcoma patients. Additionally, case–control study matching by age, gender, site, and metastatic status at diagnosis with 1:3 ratio of 36 diaphyseal to 108 metaphyseal osteosarcomas patients was also conducted.

Results

Five-year overall survival and metastasis-free survival of the three groups including diaphyseal, metaphyseal, and whole bone osteosarcoma patients showed significant difference (P = .029 and P = .013, respectively), although there is no difference for the survivals between proximal and distal metaphyseal osteosarcoma patients. Case-control study showed that patients with diaphyseal osteosarcomas had a significantly larger tumour (mean 13.5 cm vs 10 cm, P = .026), and demonstrated higher pathologic fracture rate (28% vs 12%, P = .033), superior 5-year metastasis-free survival (74% vs 40%, P = .0068), and slightly better 5-year overall survival (68% vs 46%, P = .074). Prognostic factor analysis showed that a pathologic fracture significantly decreased the survival of the patients with diaphyseal osteosarcoma.

Conclusions

The current study showed that diaphyseal osteosarcoma has distinct clinical features from metaphyseal osteosarcoma having an increased risk of pathologic fractures but with favorable survival outcome.     

放射医学实习医生实际工作能力的培养

放射诊断实习是使影像学实习生成长为放射诊断专业人才的一个重要阶段,是实现理论与实践结合的重要教学实践模式。提高放射诊断实习质量,增强医学影像专业实习生的有关临床能力是临床教学中值得重视和思考的问题。丰富的学习资源,强调影像表现与临床、病理相结合以及X线、CT、MRI并重,加强阅片和操作技能的培养,强调临床辩证思维等方法有助于改善和提高放射诊断临床教学质量。     

阿拉山口口岸地区小型哺乳动物区系调查及输入种动态分析

目的 掌握口岸地区本底小型哺乳动物种群及家、野栖鼠类的动态变化,识别外来物种,预测、预报传疫信息.方法 在本口岸及周边区域6大生态环境中进行调查,对比既往资料进行分析.结果 捕获兔形类1种、啮齿类16种、食虫类2种、食肉类1种、翼手类1种,即5目9科15属19种1022只.并对口岸输入种进行了分析.结论 家栖鼠类褐家鼠为优势种,野栖鼠类大沙鼠为优势种,这两大家、野栖鼠类的代表性种群,其主要传播媒介已发生交换和转移,加之印鼠客蚤的参与是鼠间到人间鼠疫发生的危险因素.     

Modular endoprosthetic replacement for metastatic tumours of the proximal femur

Background and aims  

Endoprosthetic replacements of the proximal femur are commonly required to treat destructive metastases with either impending or actual pathological fractures at this site. Modular prostheses provide an off the shelf availability and can be adapted to most reconstructive situations for proximal femoral replacements. The aim of this study was to assess the clinical and functional outcomes following modular tumour prosthesis reconstruction of the proximal femur in 100 consecutive patients with metastatic tumours and to compare them with the published results of patients with modular and custom made endoprosthetic replacements.     

Buruli ulcer in Malawi - a first report

One hundred and sixty-one specimens swabbed from as many patients with chronic wounds/ulcers over a period of eight months yielded 3 acid-alcohol fast bacilli (AFB) organisms that slowly grew only at 32°C on Lowenstein-Jensen(LJ) medium producing creamy-yellow colonies between 39 and 45 days post-incubation. Mycobacterial organisms harvested from culture were strongly positive when subjected to both catalase spot test and catalase heat stability test indicating the presence of Mycobacterium ulcerans, the aetiological agent of Buruli ulcer.     

新疆伊犁维吾尔族,哈萨克族和蒙古族指纹白线正常值分析

对我国新疆伊犁维吾尔族，哈萨克族和蒙古族共１３７５人的指纹白线正常值分布进行了研究。这三个民族的指纹白线出现率分别是２３．３６％，２０．３１％和９．２％，并进行了性别，指别和不同民族间差异的比较。