The current status of secondary cytoreduction in ovarian cancer: a systematic review

Ovarian cancer causes more deaths than any other cancer of the female genital tract. Despite improvements in management and treatment, survival remains low in patients with extensive disease at presentation, which usually leads to eventual recurrence. Treatment of recurrence remains challenging. Although the use of secondary cytoreduction to treat recurrent disease has become widespread, its utility remains unproven.

This systematic review examines all the relevant electronic literature. An electronic literature search was conducted in the PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE databases from January 1980 through December 2019.

Several relevant retrospective studies have been published, and these unanimously suggest that secondary cytoreduction is associated with an increase in progression-free and overall survival after relapse. Despite sound statistical methods, these studies are unfortunately limited by significant confounding inherent to the retrospective approach and by selection bias, given that healthier patients with less disease have historically been selected for surgery. Data from clinical trials are currently evolving. Early data from DESKTOP III demonstrate improved progression-free survival with secondary cytoreduction, whereas GOG-0213 found no difference in progression-free or overall survival.

Secondary cytoreduction remains a viable treatment option for select patients for now, but this is entirely dependent on the highly anticipated overall survival results of DESKTOP III and SOC 1.