Combined Treatment Strategy and Outcome of High Risk Neuroblastoma: Experience of the Children’s Cancer Hospital-Egypt

Abstract

Background: Neuroblastoma (NB) is remarkable for its wide spectrum of clinical behavior and biological characteristics in relation to outcome. The use of aggressive therapy , including autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) and the addition of isoretionin (cis-Retinoic Acid/cis-RA) , h as increased survival rates of patients with advanced disease. Methods: Pediatric 271 newly diagnosed high risk NB patients were prospectively enrolled i nto the study. Patients received neoadjuvant chemotherapy of alternating cycles: [cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine (CAdO)] and [etoposide, carboplatin]. Intensification courses of “ICE” (ifosfamide, carboplatin, and etoposide) regimen were administered to patients with bone marrow (BM) residual infiltration. Whenever safely feasible, complete surgical resection or debulking of the primary tumor was attempted for patients achiev ing partial response. Eligible patients underwent HSCT , while radiation therapy to the primary and metastatic sites , as well as maintenance with cis-RA was given for 6 months. Results: The median age of our patients was 2.8 years with male to female ratio of 1.65:1. At 4 years, the overall and event free survival s were 33.7% and 23.3% for the entire group under study, with significantly higher rates (42.7% and 35.6%, respectively) for HSCT patients (n = 94; p < 0.001). The outcome was also significantly correlated with response to induction therapy, pathological subtype, as well as other variables. Conclusion: Myeloablative therapy followed by stem cell rescue is regarded as the most important goal of high risk NB treatment to improve survival till present . Each of consolidation HSCT, post induction disease status, as well as international neuroblastoma pathology classification (INPC) subtype was an independent predictive variable of survival. A collaborative effort with an emphasis on biologic characteristics of aggressive disease and tailored therapy needs to be strengthened to further our understanding of this disease .