Background & objective: The overall survival rate of children and adolescents with germ cell tumor is more than 75% after adopting combined therapy. However, the prognosis varies with stage, pathologic type, and primary tumor site. This study was to analyze the clinical characteristics and treatment outcome of children and adolescents with germ cell tumor, and to investigate the prognostic factors and therapeutic strategy.
Methods: Clinical characteristics, treatment outcome, and prognostic factors of 44 children and adolescents with germ cell tumor, treated in Cancer Center of Sun Yat-sen University from Jan. 1997 to Dec. 2005, were analyzed. Survival rate was calculated by Kaplan-Meier method.
Results: Of the 44 patients, 25 received adjuvant chemotherapy after operation; 1 received operation alone; 18 received induction chemotherapy. Of the 18 patients, 7 received tumor resection after chemotherapy; 2 patients with primary mediastinal chorioepithelioma with multiple metastases received radiotherapy on residual disease after chemotherapy; 1 patient with postoperative abdominal metastasis and 1 with postoperative lung metastasis achieved complete remission after chemotherapy; 1 patient with mediastinal sinus tumor achieved partial remission after chemotherapy; 6 had poor response to chemotherapy and died of disease progression. Chemotherapy-treated patients received platinum-containing regimens for 2-7 cycles. The median follow-up was 32 months. The overall 3-year survival rate was 84.8%. The 3-year survival rate was 100% for stage I-II patients, 83.3% for stage III patients, 65.6% for stage IV patients, and 66.7% for relapsed patients. For previously untreated patients, the 3-year survival rate was 96.0% for gonadal germ cell tumor patients and 61.0% for extragonadal germ cell tumor patients.
Conclusion: Surgery combined with platinum-containing chemotherapy can improve efficacy and survival of children and adolescents with germ cell tumor. For the patients with stage IV, relapsed, and metastatic tumors, novel therapeutic regimens with increased dose intensity need further investigation.