title: Four year experience of sarcoma of soft tissues and bones in a tertiary care hospital and review of literature.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Sarcoma encompasses an uncommon group of cancer and the data is insufficient from Pakistan. We report our four years experience of Sarcoma of soft tissues and bones.
  
  
  METHODS
  This cross sectional study was carried out at Aga Khan University Hospital from 2004 to 2008. The patients were divided into two groups from the outset i.e. initially diagnosed and relapsed group and separate sub group analysis was conducted.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Out of 93 newly diagnosed patients, 58 belonged to bone sarcoma and 35 to soft tissue sarcoma group. While for relapsed patients, 5 had soft tissue sarcoma and 9 had bone sarcoma. Mean age was 32.5 years. At presentation, approximately two third patients had localised disease while remaining one third had metastatic disease. The Kaplan Meier estimate of median recurrence free survival was 25 months, 35 months, and 44 months for Osteogenic sarcoma, Ewing's sarcoma and Chondrosarcoma respectively. For Leiomyosarcoma and Synovial sarcoma, it was 20 and 19 months respectively. The grade of the tumour (p = 0.02) and surgical margin status (p = 0.001) were statistically significant for determination of relapse of disease.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The median recurrence free survival of patients in our study was comparable to the reported literature but with significant lost to follow rate. Further large-scale, multi centre studies are needed to have a more comprehensive understanding of this heterogeneous disease in our population.
authors.affiliation: Aga Khan University Hospital, Stadium Road, Karachi 74800, Pakistan. drtayyaba@gmail.com
authors.forename: Tayyaba Z
authors.initials: TZ
authors.lastname: Ansari
authors.forename: Nehal
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Masood
authors.forename: Asra
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Parekh
authors.forename: Rabab Z
authors.initials: RZ
authors.lastname: Jafri
authors.forename: Syed N
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Niamatullah
authors.forename: Adnan A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Zaidi
authors.forename: Masood
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Umer
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001859:Bone Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010154:Pakistan; D012509:Sarcoma / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D012983:Soft Tissue Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D016019:Survival Analysis; D055815:Young Adult