Survival analysis in patients with follicular dendritic cell sarcoma: a population-based study

Follicular dendritic cell sarcoma (FDCS) is a rare low-intermediate grade malignant neoplasm. To date, published data on FDCS clinical courses are sparse, and no conditional survival study has been performed. Thus, we retrospectively analyzed 187 patients diagnosed with FDCS from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database. In this study, the median age at diagnosis was 50 years and 91 (48.7%) patients were male. The most common primary location was the abdomen/pelvis (82, 43.9%). The 1-year, 3-year, and 5-year overall survival (OS) were 88.7%, 69.0%, and 59.8%, respectively. The 5-year conditional overall survival increased from 65.7% at baseline to 83.8% in 5-year survivors. The 3-year FDCS-specific death rate was 26.7% and the rate of death from other reasons was 3.7%. In addition, the annual death hazard was the highest in the first four years after diagnosis and increased again in the 7th and 8th years. Age > 60 years at diagnosis, metastatic disease, and FDCS in thoracic organs were associated with shorter OS and FDCS-specific survival. In addition, FDCS patients, with either local or metastatic disease, could benefit from surgery therapy. In addition, adjuvant radiotherapy or chemotherapy for local disease provided no significant improvement in overall survival or FDCS-specific survival. We hope these findings may guide treatments and surveillance strategies for FDCS patients in clinical practice.