Prophylactic HIPEC in pT4 Colon Tumors: Proactive Approach or Overtreatment?

The peritoneum is the second most common site for metastasis in patients with colorectal cancer. Various factors have been studied to identify patients at risk of developing peritoneal carcinomatosis (PC), including T4 tumors. The objectives were to assess the incidence of synchronous and metachronous PC, explore potential risk factors for developing PC as the only site of metastasis, and identify which patients might be candidates for prophylactic hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC).

We conducted a retrospective analysis of 125 patients with pT4 colon cancer who underwent surgery in a single center between January 2010 and December 2014.

Of the 947 colon cancer patients who underwent surgery, 125 (13.2%) were diagnosed with pT4a or b colon carcinoma. The median follow-up was 3.7 years. The overall rate of PC was 34.3%, being synchronous in 12% and metachronous in 22.3% of cases. The 8% and 6% of synchronous and metachronous cases of PC respectively were isolated (single site) metastasis. The incidence of PC was 6.1% at 1 year and 14.5% at 3 years after surgery. pT4 was not found to be an independent risk factor for the development of PC (p = 0.231). Nonetheless, the rate of metachronous PC as a single site of metastasis was higher in patients with pT4 tumors and peritoneal nodules around the primary tumor and/or tumor perforation (p = 0.027) and/or who underwent emergency surgery (p = 0.043) than other patients.

Considering pT4 tumor stage as the only risk factor for the development of PC in deciding whether to administer prophylactic HIPEC would lead to unjustified overtreatment.