Survival after secondary cytoreductive surgery and chemotherapy compared with chemotherapy alone for first recurrence in patients with platinum-sensitive epithelial ovarian cancer and no residuals after primary treatment. A registry-based study

Outcomes of secondary cytoreductive surgery in patients with platinum-sensitive recurrent ovarian cancer progressed after prior poly (adenosine diphosphate-ribose) polymerase inhibitors: A retrospective cohort study

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the impact of previous poly (adenosine diphosphate-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor therapy on the effectiveness of secondary cytoreductive surgery (SCS) in patients with platinum-sensitive recurrent ovarian cancer (PSROC).

METHODS

We identified patients with PSROC who underwent SCS at the Cancer Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Science, between January 2010 and December 2022. Postoperative complications within 30 days were categorized using the Accordion Severity Grading System. The Kaplan‒Meier method was used to estimate both overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS), and multivariate analysis was used to identify independent prognostic factors.

RESULTS

Of the 265 patients included, 39 received prior PARP inhibitor therapy (Group A), and 226 did not (Group B). The rates of complete resection after SCS did not significantly differ between the two groups (79.5 % for Group A vs. 81.0 % for Group B; p = 0.766). As of December 2023, Group A exhibited a significantly shorter median PFS (14.2 months) than Group B (22.5 months; p = 0.002). Furthermore, the 3-year OS rate was lower in Group A (72.5 %) than in Group B (82.7 %; p = 0.015). The incidence of severe postoperative complications was comparable between Groups A and B (7.7 % vs. 1.8 %; p = 0.061). Multivariate analysis revealed that prior PARP inhibitor therapy significantly reduced the median PFS (hazard ratio (HR) = 4.434; p = 0.021) and OS (HR = 2.076; p = 0.010).

CONCLUSIONS

SCS for PSROC demonstrated reduced efficacy in patients previously treated with PARP inhibitors compared to those without prior PARP inhibitor treatment.

Eradication of Isolated Para-Aortic Nodal Recurrence in a Patient with an Advanced High Grade Serous Ovarian Carcinoma: Our Experience and Review of Literature

We report a case report regarding the eradication of isolated lymph-nodal para-aortic recurrence in the aortic region down the left renal vein (LRV) in a patient treated two years earlier in another hospital for a FIGO stage IC2 high-grade serous ovarian carcinoma with a video showing the para-aortic space after eradication of the metastatic tissue. A 66 year-old woman was admitted 24 months after the initial surgical procedure for an increased Ca 125 level and CT scan that revealed a 3 cm para-aortic infrarenal lymph-nodal recurrence that was confirmed by PET/CT scan. A secondary cytoreductive surgery (SCS) with a para-aortic lymph-nodal dissection of the tissue down the LRV and radical omentectomy were performed: during the cytoreduction, the right hemicolon was mobilized. The anterior surface of the inferior vena cava (IVC), aorta and LRV were exposed. The metastatic lymph nodes were detected in the para-ortic space down the proximal part of the LRV and eradicated; an en bloc infrarenal lymph-node dissection from the aortocaval region was performed. The operative time during the surgical procedure was 212 min with a blood loss of 120 mL. No intra- and postoperative complications, including ureteral or vascular injury or renal dysfunction, occurred. At histological examination, three dissected lymph nodes were positive for metastasis, and the patient was discharged five days after laparotomy without side effects and underwent chemotherapy 3 weeks later; after a follow-up of 42 months, no recurrence was detected. In conclusion, secondary debulking surgery can be considered a safe and effective therapeutic option for the management of recurrences, although long-term follow-ups are necessary to evaluate the overall oncologic outcomes of this procedure.

The survival outcome and complication of secondary cytoreductive surgery plus chemotherapy in recurrent ovarian cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Objective

The aim of this meta-analysis was to assess the effectiveness and safety of secondary cytoreductive surgery plus chemotherapy (SCS + CT) in recurrent ovarian cancer (ROC). Our secondary purpose was to analyze whether patients could benefit from complete resection.

Methods

We searched EMBASE, MEDLINE, the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, from inception to April 2021. We used appropriate scales to assess the risk of bias. Data from included studies that reported median PFS or OS were weighted by individual study sample size, and aggregated for meta-analysis. We calculated the pooled proportion of complications within 30 days after surgery.

Results

We identified 13 articles, including three RCTs and ten retrospective cohort studies. A total of 4572 patients were included, of which 916 patients achieved complete resection, and all patients were comparable at baseline. Compared with chemotherapy alone, SCS + CT significantly improved the PFS (HR = 0.54, 95% CI: 0.43–0.67) and OS (HR = 0.60, 95% CI: 0.44–0.81). Contrary to the results of cohort studies, the meta-analysis of RCTs showed that SCS + CT could not bring OS benefits (HR = 0.93, 95% CI: 0.66–1.3). The subgroup analysis showed the prognostic importance of complete resection. Compared with chemotherapy alone, complete resection was associated with longer PFS (HR = 0.53, 95% CI: 0.45–0.61) and OS (HR = 0.56, 95% CI: 0.39–0.81), while incomplete resection had no survival benefit. Additionally, complete resection could maximize survival benefit compared with incomplete resection (HR = 0.56, 95% CI: 0.46–0.69; HR = 0.61, 95% CI: 0.50–0.75). The pooled proportion for complications at 30 days was 21% (95% CI: 0.12–0.30), and there was no statistical difference in chemotherapy toxicity between the two groups.

Conclusion

The review indicated that SCS + CT based regimens was correlated with better clinical prognosis for patients with recurrent ovarian cancer, but the interpretation of OS should be cautious. The meta-analysis emphasizes the importance of complete resection, suggesting that the potential benefits of prolonging survival may outweigh the disadvantages of any short-term complications associated with surgery.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13048-021-00842-9.

Emerging serine-threonine kinase inhibitors for treating ovarian cancer

Introduction: Ovarian cancer is the leading cause of gynecologic cancer death, owing to high rates of incurable, recurrent disease after initial treatment. Serine threonine kinases (STKs) have been proposed as potential therapeutic targets in ovarian cancer because of their role in the initiation and progression of cancers. Experience in non-ovarian cancers suggests that STK inhibitors are active against tumors with specific molecular alterations.Areas covered: This review discusses STK inhibitors in active development in phase II/III clinical trials for ovarian cancer. PubMed and ClinicalTrials.gov were systematically searched to identify STK inhibitor trials for ovarian cancer; active development was confirmed via Pharmaprojects. Available data regarding the efficacy and safety of these compounds are explored.Expert opinion: STK inhibitors currently in development have modest activity as single agents and are unlikely to achieve approval as monotherapy for unselected ovarian cancer patients. Combination trials of STK inhibitors with chemotherapy and/or targeted therapies have suggested an acceptable efficacy/toxicity ratio for certain combinations but confirmatory studies are needed. Carefully designed trials, especially those including somatic molecular analysis, may help identify the subsets of patients most likely to benefit from these therapeutic strategies and determine the role of STK inhibitors in the evolving landscape of precision oncology.

Major clinical research advances in gynecologic cancer in 2018

Nineteen topics were selected as major clinical research advances in gynecologic oncology in 2018. For cervical cancer, the importance of human papillomavirus (HPV) testing alone as primary cervical cancer screening method and negative survival impact of minimally invasive surgery in early-stage cervical cancer were addressed. For ovarian cancer, cost-effectiveness of genetic testing to prevent cancer, use of analgesics and oral pill to reduce cancer risk, efficacy of secondary cytoreductive surgery and hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy, update in the use of poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitor, and efficacy of anti-angiogenic targeted treatments, including bevacizumab and tyrosine kinase inhibitors, were reviewed. For corpus cancer, sentinel lymph node mapping technique, adjuvant therapy in high-risk endometrial cancer (PORTEC-3), and targeted therapy in recurrent disease were covered. For the field of radiation oncology, survival outcomes of chemoradiation compared with chemotherapy alone in metastatic cervical cancer and new findings regarding the use of neoadjuvant chemotherapy in locally advanced cervical cancer were introduced. Lastly, for breast cancer, the use of talazoparib in patients with germline BRCA1/2 mutation, ovarian suppression for premenopausal patients, adjuvant chemotherapy guided by 21-gene assay, and combination therapy of atezolizumab and nab-paclitaxel for triple-negative cancer as well as promising overall survival results of palbociclib and fulvestrant in advanced breast cancer were briefly mentioned.