Depth of invasion for appendiceal metastasis of ovarian cancers: does it have any clinical significance?

Aim: Depth of appendiceal metastasis in patients with epithelial ovarian carcinoma (EOC) has not been previously analyzed for a possible relationship with clinico-pathological variables.

Methods: Sixty-nine patients with EOC treated at Hacettepe University were retrospectively analyzed. All of the patients had appendiceal metastasis. Pathological slides were re-reviewed by the same pathologist. Appendiceal metastases were defined as serosal (if tumoral spread involved only serosa of the appendix) or sero-mucosal (if tumoral spread also involved either muscular or mucosal surfaces of the appendix). Univariate and multivariate analysis did not reveal a significant difference with respect to the prognostic variables between the groups.

Results: Thirty-nine patients had serosal appendiceal metastasis (56.5%), while the remaining 30 patients (43.5%) had appendiceal metastasis extending toward the muscular layer (seromucosal metastasis: 16 within muscularis mucosa, 14 within the mucosa of the appendix). The mean age at the time of diagnosis was 54.58 years (range, 26-88 years), with no significant difference between the groups (P = 0.9). Comparison of the survival rates between the two groups did not reveal a significant difference. Three-year survival rates were 23.3% in the serosal metastasis and 27.9% in the seromucosal metastasis group (P = 0.9). This figure was 25% for patients with only muscular metastasis and 41.6% for patients with appendiceal metastasis extending to the mucosal layer (P = 0.2).

Conclusion: This is the first report to analyze the metastatic pattern of EOC on the appendix with respect to depth of invasion which could not reveal a significant difference.