title: Therapeutic regimens and prognostic factors of brain metastatic cancers.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This work aims to investigate the therapeutic regimen of brain metastatic cancers and the relationship between clinical features and prognosis.
  
  
  METHODS
  Clinical data of 184 patients with brain metastatic cancers were collected and analysed for the relationship between survival time and age, gender, primary diseases, quantity of brain metastatic foci, their position, extra cranial lesions, and therapeutic regimens.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The average age of onset was 59.1 years old. The median survival time (MST) was 15.0 months, and the patients with breast cancer as the primary disease had the longest survival time. Females had a longer survival time than males. Patients with meningeal metastasis had extremely short survival time. Those with less than 3 brain metastatic foci survived longer than patients with more than 3. The MST of patients receiving radiotherapy only and the patients receiving chemotherapy only were all 10.0 months while the MST of patients receiving combination therapy was 16.0 months. Multiple COX regression analysis demonstrated that gender, primary diseases, and quantity of brain metastatic foci were independent prognostic factors for brain metastatic cancers.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Chemotherapy is as important as radiotherapy in the treatment of brain metastatic cancer. Combination therapy is the best treatment mode. Male gender, brain metastatic cancers originating in the gastrointestinal tract, more than 3 metastatic foci, and involvement of meninges indicate a worse prognosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy and Chemotherapy, Workers' Hospital, Tangshan, Hebei, China. wenguangsong@163.com
authors.forename: Wen-Guang
authors.initials: WG
authors.lastname: Song
authors.forename: Yi-Feng
authors.initials: YF
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Rui-Lin
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Yin-E
authors.initials: YE
authors.lastname: Qu
authors.forename: Zhi
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Guo-Zhong
authors.initials: GZ
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Ying
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.forename: Fang
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Fang
authors.forename: Hong
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chen
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000971:Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols / Q000627:therapeutic use; D001921:Brain / Q000473:pathology; D001932:Brain Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000401:mortality* / Q000532:radiotherapy / Q000556:secondary*; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality; D003131:Combined Modality Therapy; D005260:Female; D005770:Gastrointestinal Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008577:Meningeal Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality / Q000556:secondary; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D013534:Survival