[Guidelines for surgical and multimodal therapy of malignant soft tissue tumors]

An optimal treatment of soft tissue sarcomas is influenced by multiple factors. The high local recurrence rate is often based on inadequate surgical primary therapy. An improvement of prognosis which is still unfavourable in some patients can be achieved only if guidelines described in this paper gain increasing influence in practice. A treatment concept for soft tissue sarcomas must be worked out interdisciplinary within the knowledge of all relevant data. Surgery is just one but an essential component of therapy to be placed at the right time. To achieve a R0-resection is an important requirement for survival free of recurrence. However, the influence of a local recurrence on overall survival remains controversial. Amputations should be taken into consideration only after exhaustion of all reconstructive procedures available.