Stereotactic radiosurgery for the treatment of brain metastases; results from a single institution experience

• Published in: Irish journal of medical science Vol. 182; no. 3; pp. 481 - 485
• Main Authors: Burke, D., Mascott, C., Rock, L., Callinan, S., Mihai, A., Thirion, P., Armstrong, J. G.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Springer-Verlag 01-09-2013
• Subjects: Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Brain - surgery; Brain Neoplasms - secondary; Brain Neoplasms - surgery; Family Medicine; Female; General Practice; Humans; Internal Medicine; Kaplan-Meier Estimate; Male; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Original Article; Radiosurgery - methods; Retrospective Studies; Salvage Therapy; Varian trilogy; Stereotactic radiosurgery; Brain metastases; Linear accelerator
• ISSN: 0021-1265; 1863-4362
• DOI: 10.1007/s11845-013-0918-x

Background
Stereotactic radiosurgery is frequently used for the treatment of brain metastases. This study provides a retrospective evaluation of patients with secondary lesions of the brain treated with stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) at our institution.
Aims
To provide outcome data from a single institutional experience with SRS and identify any significant prognostic factors in the cohort.
Methods
Sixty-seven patients received first time SRS to 86 intracranial metastases between 2007 and 2010. Sixteen patients were excluded from this study due to the absence of post-treatment neuroimaging, resulting in 51 patients with 64 treated lesions. Of these patients, 37 (72.5 %) received SRS electively, while 14 (27.5 %) received salvage SRS after brain metastasis progression following whole brain radiotherapy.
Results
Median survival for the entire group was 15 months from the date of radiosurgery. Patients without active extracranial disease had statistically significant survival time than those with active extracranial disease (
P
 = 0.03). 45 (70.3 %) lesions achieved local tumour control in 34 patients (66.7 %) with a mean follow-up period of 10.7 months (range 1.7–33.6 months, 95 % confidence interval 6.6–9.8 months).
Conclusions
The results reported in this study equate to those reported in other series consolidating SRS as an effective treatment option with few serious complications. Developments in systemic disease control will see further improvements in overall survival.