OBJECTIVE: The effect of multidisciplinary therapy conducted at the sarcoma center of our hospital was examined to determine whether therapy undertaken here improved the prognosis of patients with soft-tissue sarcoma.
METHODS: The clinical findings and prognoses of patients treated before the establishment of the sarcoma center (72 patients from April 2016 to March 2018) and those treated after (155 patients from April 2018 to March 2021) were compared.
RESULTS: The mean number of patients increased from 36.0 to 51.7 per year after the establishment of the sarcoma center. The proportion of patients with stage IV disease also increased from 8.3% to 12.9% after establishment of the sarcoma center. The 3-year survival rate of patients, considering all stages, decreased from 80.0% to 78.3% after establishment of the sarcoma center rather than showing an increase. The 3-year survival rate of patients with stage II and III disease increased from 78.6% to 84.7%, and that of stage III patients with retroperitoneal sarcoma increased from 70.0% to 86.7% after establishment of the sarcoma center. However, no statistically significant difference was observed in the survival curves.
CONCLUSIONS: The establishment of a sarcoma center has contributed to centralizing treatment for soft-tissue sarcoma. Multidisciplinary therapy at sarcoma centers may improve the prognosis of patients with soft-tissue sarcomas.

暂无摘要。

The prognosis of patients with metastatic or recurrent breast cancer (MBC) is improving as novel treatments are developed. The present study compared the clinical characteristics of patients with MBC with or without a complete clinical response (cCR) and identified the survival-associated factors. This was a retrospective study, which included 171 patients treated for MBC between 2011 and 2017 at the Shiga Medical Center for Adults. Neutrophil to lymphocytes ratios (NLRs) were determined in blood samples. The median follow-up period following diagnosis of MBC was 44 months (range, 0-217 months). A total of 32 patients (18.7%) achieved a cCR. Compared with the non-cCR group, the cCR group had significantly fewer metastases or recurrences (P<0.001), significantly fewer visceral metastases (P<0.001), a significantly lower NLR (P<0.001) and were diagnosed with primary breast cancer at a significantly earlier stage (P=0.003). Prognosis was significantly improved in the cCR group compared with the non-cCR group (P<0.001) and a high NLR (≥19) independently predicted worse survival in a multivariate analysis (P=0.0218; hazard ratio, 1.75; 95% confidence interval, 1.09-2.85). In conclusion, the present study determined that achieving a cCR and having a low NLR are important for the long-term survival of patients with MBC.