Fifteen years' review of advanced childhood neuroblastoma from a single institution in Hong Kong.
OBJECTIVE
To assess the progress in the treatment of advanced childhood neuroblastoma.


METHODS
From 1981 to 1996, there were 32 children with neuroblastoma (NB) diagnosed, staged and treated in our institution. There were 4 patients with stage II NB (12%), 5 stage III (16%), 21 stage IV (66%) and 2 stage IV s (6%). The NBs were excised if CT scan indicated that the tumors were operable. For advanced NB, stages III and IV, multiple drug chemotherapy was started first and operability was assessed with serial CT scan examinations. Once the X-ray imaging indicated the tumors were operable, surgical interventions were done. The medical records of the advanced NB were reviewed.


RESULTS
In the initial period of the study, 9 patients were treated using the VAC protocol [vincristine (vcr), adriamycin (adria) and cyclophosphamide (cyc)]. No patient was convertible to operable and all died with a mean survival of 10 months. OPEC [vcr, cyc, VM26, cisplatin (cis)], Rapid COJEC (carboplatin, VP16, vcr, cis and cyc) and more recently N6 protocol (cyc, adria, vcr, VP16, cis) was used for 17 patients. 80% of them were converted to operable. In 4 patients, surgical specimens showed only necrotic tissue without viable tumor tissue and 6 (35%) tumors were converted to ganglioneuroma or ganglioneuroblastoma. Although 2 (12%) patients died of fungal septicemia and 1 (6%) developed Fanconi's syndrome after chemotherapy, the mean survival period increased to 27 months. In the 10 survivors (60%), 4 had megatherapy with melphalan followed by autologous peripheral blood stem cell (PBSC) transplantation and 2 were waiting for transplantation.


CONCLUSIONS
There is a high percentage of advanced NB on presentation in Hong Kong. With more potent multiple drug chemotherapy for advanced stage NB there are (1) improvement in the survival of these patients, (2) opportunities for more operations for tumor excision and (3) opportunities for autologous PBSC transplantation for better tumor eradication.
Leung
C K
CK
Department of Surgery, University of Hong Kong, Queen Mary Hospital, China.
D000310:Adrenal Gland Neoplasms / Q000628:therapy*; D000971:Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols / Q000627:therapeutic use; D002648:Child; D003131:Combined Modality Therapy; D018380:Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation; D006723:Hong Kong; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D009447:Neuroblastoma / Q000628:therapy*