Staged Resection with Temporizing VAC and Local Recurrence for Soft Tissue Sarcomas: A Multi-Institutional Review

Background/Objectives: Staged resection with temporizing vacuum-assisted closure (VAC) has been adopted to facilitate margin assessment and local control of soft tissue sarcomas (STS). Accordingly, the objective of this study is to compare rates of local recurrence (LR) among superficial STS patients treated with and without temporizing VAC therapy. Methods: We conducted a multi-institutional retrospective cohort study of superficial STS patients treated at three tertiary care centers. Patients were matched by grade, and descriptive statistics and multivariate binary logistic regression were performed. Results: After matching, 314 superficial STS patients were included in analysis. VAC patients were more likely to present with a history of prior unplanned excision (p = 0.024), with recurrent disease (p = 0.004), harbor a diagnosis of myxofibrosarcoma (p < 0.001), and have positive initial surgical margins (p < 0.001). After multivariate analysis, VAC use remained independently associated with increased LR rates (OR = 4.117; p = 0.003). Conclusions: In this multi-institutional analysis of superficial STS patients, staged resection with temporizing VAC was not associated with improved LR rates. Rather, the VAC cohort represented distinctly higher-risk tumor biology and complex oncologic presentations, in whom the risk of LR may not be fully mitigated by surgical staging alone.