Analysis of postoperative radiation therapy in stage I through III epithelial ovarian carcinoma.

A retrospective long-term analysis of the results of primary postoperative radiotherapy in 106 women with invasive epithelial ovarian carcinoma is presented. Forty-two women received open-field total abdominopelvic irradiation, and 64 received treatment by various subtotal abdominopelvic techniques. The mean follow-up of living patients in the two groups is 86 and 116 months, respectively. Women who had Federation International Gynecology and Oncology (FIGO) stages I through III-A with no postoperative residual disease, or less than 0.5-cm abdominal and/or less than 2-cm pelvic residual disease formed a favorable group in whom total abdominopelvic irradiation resulted in a 71% 10-year actuarial relapse-free survival rate compared with 40% for those treated by subtotal abdominopelvic techniques (P less than or equal to .0205). The survival improvement due to the total abdominopelvic technique in favorable patients became even more significant (P less than or equal to 0.003) after adjusting for differences in stage, grade, and postoperative residual disease volume (no, or favorable, gross). Increasing grade appeared to be associated with decreasing survival even among favorable patients treated with the optimal technique, although the differences did not approach statistical significance after adjusting for residual disease volume and stage. Surgical bowel complications were equivalent, 7.1% for total abdominopelvic v 8.1% for subtotal abdominopelvic techniques. The addition of intraperitoneal radioactive chromic phosphate increased the surgical bowel complication rate 33% over external pelvic irradiation alone without improving survival. Patients with unfavorable gross residual disease and/or FIGO stages III-B and IV were incurable by any radiation technique. Those with no, or favorable, gross residual tumor constitute a group in whom we believe open-field total abdominopelvic irradiation represents a potentially curative therapy modality.