Rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) in adults: Histologic subtypes and overall survival with actinomycin-based chemotherapy vs doxorubicin-based chemotherapy.

Abstract

11073 Background: RMS typically occurs in children. Vincristine, Actinomycin and Cyclophosphamide (VAC) based chemotherapy is the current standard. Limited data exist on the frequency of the histologic subtypes and optimal chemotherapy regimen for the treatment of adult patients with RMS. Methods: We retrospectively identified patients ≥18 years with RMS seen at our institution from 2000-2015. The analysis was performed with JMP statistical software. Results: We identified 73 patients, with a median age of 51 (range 18-85 years). The majority of patients were male (40 of 73) and presented with localized disease (59 of 73). Histologic subtypes were as follows: 32% embryonal (E), 27% alveolar (A), 36% pleomorphic (P), and 6% variants (V) (botryoid and spindle cell/sclerosing). The median overall survival (OS) for patients with localized disease was 16.2 months and metastatic disease 9 months. The median OS for patients with localized disease treated with VAC was 20.3 months (4A, 7E, 3P) and VDC (vincristine doxorubicin cyclophosphamide) was 14.1 months (3A, 3E, 2P). For those with localized disease treated with a VAC/actinomycin-based chemotherapy had a median OS of 19.5 months (4A, 9E, 3P) and with a VDC/doxorubicin-based chemotherapy had a median OS of 15.9 months (8A, 5E, 13P, 2V). Conclusions: Adult patients with RMS have an even distribution among the histologic subtypes. Given the small, unbalanced number of patients in each histologic subtype treated with VAC/actinomycin-based or VDC/Doxorubicin-based regimens, the overall survival benefit favoring the use of VAC/actinomycin-based is hypothesis generating and confirmatory studies are needed to truly determine the optional regimen for adult patients with RMS.