Adjuvant chemotherapy versus concurrent chemoradiotherapy for high-risk cervical cancer after radical hysterectomy and systematic lymphadenectomy.

Background: The aims of this study were to evaluate the efficacy and toxicity of chemotherapy (CT) compared with concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CCRT) after radical hysterectomy and lymphadenectomy in high-risk patients with early-stage cervical cancer and to evaluate whether the radicality of the lymphadenectomy would affect the outcome and toxicity of postoperative adjuvant therapy.

Methods: The cases of all patients (n = 393) with FIGO IB1-IIB cervical cancer who were treated by radical surgery at Shizuoka Cancer Center between January 2002 and December 2013 were reviewed. Of these, 111 patients met the inclusion criteria for this retrospective study: (1) high risk for occurrence due to pathologically confirmed parametrial invasion and/or pelvic lymph node metastasis; (2) postoperative treatment with adjuvant CT or CCRT. The clinical data of these patients were reviewed.

Results: Of the 111 patients, 37 and 74 patients underwent CT and CCRT, respectively. The 4-year progression-free survival rate [PFS; 71.7 (CT) vs. 68.3 % (CCRT)] and overall survival rate [76.0 (CT) vs. 82.7 % (CCRT)] did not differ significantly between the two groups. The CT group contained significantly more patients with severe neutropenia than the CCRT group (66.7 vs. 23.0 %, respectively; p < 0.001), and the CCRT group contained significantly more patients with diarrhea than the CT group (10.8 vs. 0 %, respectively; p = 0.04). The patients who had ≥40 lymph nodes dissected (≥40 group) had higher PFS than the patients who had <40 lymph nodes dissected (<40 group) (73.2 vs. 64.2 %, respectively), although the difference was not significant. In the CT group, there was no significant association between the number of dissected lymph nodes and severe toxicities. However, in the CCRT group, significantly more vomiting (p = 0.046) and edema (p = 0.046) occurred in the ≥40 group than in the <40 group.

Conclusions: Chemotherapy after surgery for high-risk patients had similar efficacy and a different toxicity profile compared with CCRT, and a more radical surgical procedure would improve the survival outcome. However, CCRT was associated with worse toxicity than CT. We advocate a prospective randomized study to compare CT with CCRT for patients with high-risk factors for recurrence.