Treatment outcomes and prognostic factors of gallbladder cancer patients after postoperative radiation therapy

BACKGROUNDS/AIMS: To investigate survival rates and prognostic factors of patients with gallbladder cancer who were treated with surgery and postoperative radiation therapy. METHODS: Seventeen gallbladder cancer patients who received surgery and postoperative radiotherapy from October 1989 to April 1998 were included in this retrospective study. Five patients had stage II, 8 patients had stage III, and 4 patients had stage IV disease according to the 1997 American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) staging. All patients received ≥40 Gy of postoperative radiotherapy with a daily dose of 2.0 Gy/fraction and 15 patients received concurrent chemotherapy. An analysis was performed for the end-points of overall and disease-free survival. RESULTS: Of the 17 patients, 13 had no residual disease (R0), 1 had microscopic residual disease (R1), and 3 had macroscopic residual disease (R2) after surgery. Among patients with no residual disease, 4 had locoregional recurrences during the follow-up period. One patient with microscopic residual disease had local recurrence. The 5-year overall survival rate was 38.2%. The median overall survival time was 21 months and the median disease-free survival time was 12 months. Old age (≥60 years old), female gender, a high pathological stage (≥IVA), and the presence of residual disease after surgery were significant prognostic factors for disease-free survival. CONCLUSIONS: Despite a high proportion of patients with advanced disease and macroscopic residual disease, the prognosis of gallbladder patients who had postoperative radiotherapy is encouraging. Additional investigation to improve the loco-regional control of gallbladder cancer patients with adverse prognostic factors is warranted.