Survival rates and prognostic factors in adrenocortical carcinoma

In the last 12 years, 41 patients with adrenocortical carcinoma were operated on at Cochin Hospital. There were 29 females and 12 males having an average age of 42 +/- 17 years. Seven of them underwent repeat operation for local recurrence after an average interval of 22 months. Eighty per cent of the tumors had secretory activity while 20% did not. Adrenalectomy and lymphadenectomy were performed on all patients. Thirteen (32%) patients underwent extensive resection because of invasive cancer. The same procedure was performed on 7 patients undergoing re-operation. Operative mortality was 4% (2 of 48 patients). Twenty-four patients died of cancer with an average survival time of 22 months (range 2-86 months) and 15 (37%) patients were still alive, 4 of them with metastases, with an average survival time of 51 months. Curative resection for the 31 patients with local (n = 21) or regional disease (n = 10) allowed a 5 year actuarial survival rate of 45%. The 5 year actuarial survival rate for patients undergoing repeat surgery was 33%. Only 1 of the 10 patients with metastases, and who had an impressive response to OP'DDD, was alive 2 years after the operation. The other 9 patients died within 3-4 months after operation. We found that neither patient characteristics or tumor characteristics were of significant prognostic value. There was no overall prolongation of survival in patients receiving OP'DDD. However 4 patients with metastases occurring in the course of their disease experienced an impressive response with OP'DDD and a relatively long survival.