The effect of contaminated surgical margins revisited

The current study was done to assess the oncologic outcomes after inadvertent intraoperative contamination in the treatment of musculoskeletal sarcomas, to determine the prognostic significance of these events. Forty-three patients with malignant lesions and either positive margins or intraoperative tumor penetration are included in the study. There were 12 bone lesions and 31 soft tissue lesions. The final margin was intracapsular in 11 patients, contaminated marginal in 13 patients, and contaminated wide in 19 patients. Thirty-two patients received radiation therapy with doses from 4560 to 7000 cGy. The mean followup was 69 months (range, 24-179 months). In patients in whom the surgical margin was contaminated, additional tissue was removed with the goal being to obtain tumor-free surgical margins. Local recurrence occurred in four of 32 patients (12.5%) with no gross residual tumor. There was a significant difference in the recurrence rate between a wide (0 of 19) versus a marginal or intracapsular margin (nine of 24) based on the final surgical margin. High-grade lesions were more likely to recur than low-grade lesions, and soft tissue lesions were more likely to recur than bone lesions. Similar to previous reports, treatment of inadvertent contamination with reexcision and irrigation of the wound results in a similar recurrence rate to cases without contamination. Efforts should be made to achieve a wide final margin. Adjuvant therapies should be used whenever feasible.