Cancer Science & Therapy

Second Primary Tumours of the Head and Neck are not Associated With Adverse Overall Survival in Oral Sccs

Abstract

Rostam Dariush Farhadieh, Petr Otahal, Kiarash Taghavi, Arash Salardini, Pamela Russell and Robert Smee

Objective: Second primary tumours (SPT) have been implicated in the dismal overall survival (OS) of head and neck Squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCC). The incidence of SPT, the SPT diagnostic time-lag and the impact on OS were assessed. Subjects and methods: 363 consecutive patients treated for primary Oral SCCs (1967-2004) were analyzed retrospectively in this study. 95.1% and 90.5% of patients reached a minimum follow-up period of 3 and 5 years respectively. Results: Of 363 patients; 68 (18.7%) were diagnosed with metachronous SPT, 49 (13.5%) developed upper aerodigestive tract (UAD)-SPT, 28 (7.7%) were diagnosed with HNSCC-SPT, and 21 (5.8%) developed lung or esophageal carcinoma. Patients with subsequent HNSCC-SPT had a better median survival during follow-up than those not diagnosed with SPTs (p=0.0018). The rate of mortality in these patients showed a substantial increase compared to patients with no subsequent SPT Diagnosis after 144 months. After 200 months the survival experience was no better than those without SPT. Conclusion: These results suggest a better OS for patients afflicted with HNSCC-SPT. This also reflects that at least some of the noted improved OS of HNSCC-SPT patients is due to temporally cumulated risk associated with developing SPT.