Clinical characteristics and outcomes of gastrointestinal stromal tumor patients receiving surgery with or without TKI therapy: a retrospective real-world study

PURPOSE: To retrospectively analyze the clinical characteristics of patients undergoing surgical treatment for gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) in Ruijin Hospital and explore the relevant prognosis clinical factors after surgical treatment. METHODS: We screened out 1015 patients with GISTs diagnosed and treated during January 2010 to December 2019. We performed univariate analysis by the log-rank test and multivariate analysis by COX regression. The Kaplan–Meier method was used to estimate the disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) of the whole group. RESULTS: All 1015 patients in the whole group received radical surgery, and the proportion of patients with high, intermediate, and low risk was 31.1%, 21.7%, and 47.3%, respectively. Among the 480 low-risk patients, surgery could achieve radical therapy; only the Ki-67 index was related to DFS and OS (DFS: p = 0.032, OS: p = 0.009) among the 140 intermediate-risk patients with tumors located in the stomach, whether received Tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) therapy did not affect the prognosis of patients (DFS: p = 0.716, OS: p = 0.848). Among the 331 high-risk patients, those with non-gastric tumors (those outside the stomach, duodenum, and small intestine, HR 1.55, 95% CI 1.19–2.00, p < 0.001), tumor diameter > 10 cm (hazard ratio, HR 2.63, 95% confidence interval, CI 2.09–4.03, p < 0.001), as well as high-risk patients with mitotic rate > 10/50 HPF (HR 2.74, 95% CI 2.00–3.76, p < 0.001), the overall prognosis was obviously worse than that of other patients. For some high-risk patients, prolonged postoperative imatinib therapy could significantly improve the survival of patients (HR 0.43, 95% CI 0.15–0.66, p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: For the vast majority of GIST patients, surgery can be curative; but in intermediate-risk patients, the Ki-67 index and postoperative TKI treatment are closely related to prognosis. For intermediate-risk patients whose primary tumor is the stomach, the value of TKI-targeted therapy after surgery seem be not necessary in our study. However, for some high-risk patients, the prognosis of patients can be improved by appropriately prolonging the treatment time of TKI. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12957-023-02897-y.