The impact of lymph node dissection on apparent Stage I epithelial ovarian carcinoma: A population-based study.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To explore the impact of lymphadenectomy on the prognosis of women of reproductive age with clinically apparent Stage I epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). METHODS: Data of women of reproductive age with Stage I EOC, diagnosed between 2010 and 2016, were extracted from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results database. Five-year cancer-specific survival (CSS) was evaluated using the Kaplan-Meier method. Multivariate Cox analysis was performed to evaluate the effect of lymph node dissection on survival. Propensity score (PS) matching was conducted to balance various clinicopathologic factors. RESULTS: Of 2222 patients included, 1609 (72.4%) received lymph node dissection. The rate of histopathologically confirmed lymph node metastasis was highest in serous subtype (10.2%) and lowest in mucinous subtype (2.2%). No significant difference between the lymphadenectomy and non-lymphadenectomy groups in 5-year CSS was observed in the original cohort (P = 0.364) or in the PS matching cohort (P = 0.248). Nevertheless, there was a significant difference between the lymphadenectomy and non-lymphadenectomy groups for patients with Stage IC EOC (92.4% vs. 88.1%, P = 0.027). According to the multivariate analysis, performance of the lymphadenectomy was not significantly associated with CSS in the original cohort (P = 0.163) or the PS matching cohort (P = 0.101). CONCLUSION: Dissection of lymph nodes was not significantly associated with improved prognosis for most Stage I EOC, but, lymphadenectomy may be necessary for women of reproductive age with Stage IC subtype.