Effect of surgery and radiotherapy on overall survival in patients with chondrosarcoma: A SEER-based study

Chondrosarcoma is an orthopedic malignancy, and the purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of surgery and radiotherapy (RT) on the survival of patients with chondrosarcoma.

Data were obtained from the SEER database for patients diagnosed with chondrosarcoma between 1988 and 2015. All patients were divided into surgery, RT, surgery + RT, and no surgery/no RT groups. Kaplan-Meier curves were used to analyze the overall survival and cancer-specific survival of patients in different treatment groups. The propensity score matching was used to balance baseline covariates between patients in the surgery and surgery + RT groups and in the RT and surgery + RT groups.

Data from 3756 patients with chondrosarcoma were included in this study. The number of patients who underwent surgery, RT, surgery + RT, and no surgery or RT was 2885 (76.8%), 112 (3.0%), 403 (10.7%), and 356 (9.5%), respectively. Multivariate Cox regression models showed that treatment modality was independent risk factor for OS and CSS. Before PSM, Kaplan-Meier curves showed that OS and CSS were highest in the surgery group and lowest in the RT group. After PSM, although there was no significant difference in OS (p = .13) and CSS (p = .22) between the surgery and surgery + RT group, OS was longer in the surgery group than in the surgery + RT group. Additionally, OS (p < .001) and CSS (p = .009) were longer in the surgery + RT group than in the RT group after PSM.

Surgical resection was the key approach for the treatment of chondrosarcoma, while RT confers no significant advantage in improving patient survival time.