Anterior Skull Base Sarcomas: Report of Characteristics and Outcomes at a Tertiary Care Cancer Center

Abstract

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.

Keywords

head and neck sarcoma - skull base sarcoma - paranasal sarcoma - sarcoma outcomes

Note

The study was presented at the North American Skull Base Society Meeting, San Antonio, Texas, United States, February 7–9, 2020.

^* These are first co-authors.

Publication History

Received: 15 May 2020

Accepted: 01 November 2020

Article published online:
21 January 2021

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