Proposal for therapeutic approach based on prognostic factors including morphometric and flow-cytometric features in stage III-IV ovarian cancer.

In 73 patients with International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) Stage III and IV ovarian cancer the prognostic significance of morphometric and flow-cytometric features has been evaluated in comparison with more commonly used prognostic factors such as stage and tumor mass. Single features associated with prognosis were as follows: FIGO stage, bulky disease, mean and standard deviation of nuclear area, cellular DNA content, mitotic activity index, and volume percentage epithelium. Multivariate analysis showed that the most significant prognostic combination of features consisted of mean nuclear area, presence or absence of bulky disease, and FIGO stage (in sequence of decreasing importance; Mantel-Cox = 23.07, P less than 0.00001). On the basis of these factors patients with a poor prognosis can be identified. On the other hand two features were associated with an excellent prognosis namely a low mitotic index and a low-volume percentage epithelium. It is concluded that morphometric and flow-cytometric analysis in combination with clinical features can provide significant information to predict the prognosis of patients with advanced ovarian cancer treated with debulking surgery and platinum-based chemotherapy. On the basis of our data a tentative proposal for future therapeutic approaches is made.