Pretreatment computed tomographic gross tumor volume as predictor of persistence of tracheostomy and percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy tube in patients undergoing larynx preservation.

Background: Although larynx preservation affords patients improvements in laryngectomy-free survival, little has been reported regarding the functional outcomes after larynx preservation. The purpose of this study was to report the predictive value of pretreatment CT-gross tumor volume (GTV) for persistence of tracheostomy and percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) tube in larynx preservation patients.

Methods: Each patient had a CT scan before initiation of therapy and the GTV was contoured.

Results: Using recursive partitioning analysis (RPA), threshold GTVs of 27.16 cc and 12 cc were identified for association of time with tracheostomy and PEG tube, respectively. Median (95% confidence interval [CI]) times above and below these thresholds were 1.84 (1.06-not reached [NR]) and 0.75 (0.63-1.26) years, respectively (p = .03) for time with tracheostomy and 1.75 (1.34-NR) and 0.84 (0.46-NR) years, respectively (p = 0.10) for time with PEG tube.

Conclusion: This study demonstrates that pretreatment CT-GTV is predictive of an approximately 2.5-fold and approximately 2-fold, respectively, increase in time with tracheostomy and PEG tube. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Head Neck 38: First-1458, 2016.