title: CT-diagnosed severe skull base bone destruction predicts distant bone metastasis in early N-stage nasopharyngeal carcinoma.
abstract: Bone metastasis is the most frequent type of distant metastasis in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). In this study, we investigated the correlation between the skull base bone destruction and the distant bone metastasis in patients with NPC. A total of 449 cases with NPC who were diagnosed and had definitive radiotherapy from 2001 to 2006 were enrolled in this study. The skull base bone destruction was diagnosed by computed tomography (CT) in all cases, and 191 patients also underwent magnetic resonance imaging scan. Kaplan-Meier method was adopted to perform the univariate analysis; Cox regression model was used to perform multivariate analysis to determine whether the skull base bone destruction when diagnosed by CT was an independent impact factor of the distant bone metastases. The group with skull base bone destruction had a distant bone metastases rate of 9.0% (14/155), whereas the group without skull base bone destruction had rate of 4.1% (12/294). The multivariate analysis showed that the skull base bone destruction, when diagnosed by CT, was an independent impact factor of the distant bone metastases-free survival in the early N-staging cases, but was not an independent impact factor when diagnosed by MRI. The skull base bone destruction diagnosed by CT in patients with NPC had predictive value for the distant bone metastases, especially for the early N-staging cases.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Yi
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy, Hunan Cancer Hospital, The Affiliated Cancer Hospital of Xiangya School of Medicine, Central South University, Changsha; Key Laboratory of Translational Radiation Oncology, Hunan Province.
authors.forename: Zhi-Gang
authors.initials: ZG
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University.
authors.forename: Xian
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy, Hunan Cancer Hospital, The Affiliated Cancer Hospital of Xiangya School of Medicine, Central South University, Changsha; Key Laboratory of Translational Radiation Oncology, Hunan Province.
authors.forename: Jiao
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tang
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou.
authors.forename: Chang-Bin
authors.initials: CB
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Oncology in Southern China, Department of Radiotherapy, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Jing-Ye
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Oncology in Southern China, Department of Radiotherapy, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Zi-Wei
authors.initials: ZW
authors.lastname: Tu
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy, Hunan Cancer Hospital, The Affiliated Cancer Hospital of Xiangya School of Medicine, Central South University, Changsha; Key Laboratory of Translational Radiation Oncology, Hunan Province.
authors.forename: Hui
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiotherapy, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou.
authors.forename: Dao-Li
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Niu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Oncology in Southern China, Department of Radiotherapy, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yun-Fei
authors.initials: YF
authors.lastname: Xia
keywords: bone metastasis; nasopharyngeal carcinoma; radiotherapy; skull base bone destruction