Clinical analysis of 2790 children with retinoblastoma: a single-center experience in China.

BACKGROUND

In this study, we aimed to analyze the clinical characteristics and prognosis of children with retinoblastoma (RB) in a single center in China with a large sample collection spanning 17 years.

METHODS

The clinical data of 2790 children with RB treated in Beijing Tongren Hospital from 2005 to 2021 were collected, and a retrospective analysis was conducted.

RESULTS

The median age of the participants was 28.3 months. There were 3624 affected eyes, 12.4% of which were in groups A-C, 67.1% in groups D-E and 16.2% were not specified. The primary symptom observed in most cases was a white pupil, accounting for 66.5%, followed by strabismus (12.8%). The median follow-up time was 59.7 months. The enucleation rate was 71.3% (703/986) in a single left eye and 72.5% (702/968) in a single right eye. The overall survival (OS) rate was 95.8% (2444/2552) because 237 patients dropped out, and 109 died. Kaplan‒Meier survival analysis showed that the median survival time (MST) was 125.92 months [95% confidence interval (CI) = 124.83-127.01]. Cox multivariate survival analysis showed that trilateral RB (P = 0.017), metastasis site (P = 0.001), and combined distant tissue metastasis (P = 0.001) were independent prognostic factors for RB. The OS of 44 cases of familial RB was 93.2% (41/44), with an MST of 80.62 months (95% CI = 67.70-93.54).

CONCLUSIONS

The timing of eye protection treatment and enucleation should be comprehensively judged to avoid worsening prognosis due to operation time delay. More importantly, the promotion and popularization of diagnosis and treatment technologies are necessary to further improve RB prognosis.