Adult Ovarian Granulosa Cell Tumor: Role of
Systemic Chemotherapy and Surgical Treatment by Nour Tashtush in Investigations in Gynecology Research & Womens Health_Scholarly articles for women's health journal
Abstract
Ovarian granulosa cell tumors (GCT) are rare ovarian neoplasms. The main treatment for GCT is
surgical. The volume of operation depends on the stage of the disease and the age of the patient. The
possibility of maintaining fertility in patients of reproductive age in the early stages of the disease and the
feasibility of lymphadenectomy are discussed. The positive effect of repeated cytoreductive operations
for relapse was demonstrated. Role of chemotherapy in the treatment of GCT, due to the rarity of GCT
and the late recurrence of the disease, is still not defined. Adjuvant chemotherapy is not shown to protect
against relapse in patients with adult type (AGCT). Hormone therapy is considered to be a promising
direction for the palliative treatment of AGCT relapses.
Keywords: Granulosa cell tumors; Relapse; Surgical treatment; Fertility-saving treatment; Chemotherapy;
Hormone therapy; Aromatase inhibitors
Introduction
Ovarian tumors are a heterogeneous group of tumors, including
epithelial and non-epithelial ovarian tumors. Non-epithelial ovarian
tumors account for approximately 10% of all ovarian cancers, including
malignant germ cell tumors and and sex cord-stromal tumors. Sex
cord-stromal tumors consist of a heterogeneous group of neoplasms with
diverse clinicopathological features and biological behavior. GCT are
rare sex cord-stromal tumors. Their frequency is approximately 3%-5% of
all malignant ovarian tumors, and the incidence is from 0.6 to 2.1 cases
per 100000 women per year [1]. According to the histological features,
GCT are divided into two types: adult and juvenile [2]. Both adult and
juvenile types GCT, due to the uncertainty of their malignant potential,
until recently, according to the 2003 WHO histological classification,
were referred to borderline tumors due to the relatively high 5-and
10-year survival [3]. In the 2014 WHO histological classification, GCOS
were divided into borderline, which included the GCT of the juvenile
type, and the malignant GCT of the adult type [4].
Despite the definition of AGCT not as borderline, but as low-grade
malignant tumors, there are no specific recommendations for the surgical
and drug treatment in such patients. This is primarily due to the late
recurrence of the disease, requiring long-term follow-up of patients, as
well as the rarity of these tumors and conflicting data on prognosis
factors.
Surgical treatment
The main treatment is surgery (hysterectomy with bilateral
salpingoophorectomy). It was shown significant positive effect of full
staging at an early stage and primary treatment in a specialized clinic
on the indicator of five-year relapse-free survival [5]. Multivariate
analysis of multicenter retrospective study with data on 102 patients
with AGCT of an adult type did not find the effect of surgical treatment
options on the recurrence rate of the disease [6]. Fertility-saving
unilateral salpingooophorectomy is one of the options for surgical
treatment in young patients with stage IA [7,8]. Stage of the disease is
an independent prognostic factor for the occurrence of a relapse of the
disease [9,10]. For advanced disease it is recommended to perform
optimal interval cytoreduction after chemotherapy, but lymphodissection
is not recommended because according to the authors it did not affect
the recurrence rate of the disease, and metastases were not found in
histological examination of the removed lymph nodes [5].
Drug treatment
The role of drug treatment in AGCT is under discussion. Increasing of
relapse-free survival and time to progression has been reported in
high-risk patients receiving adjuvant chemotherapy [11,12]. Other
studies have not found a positive effect of chemotherapy on relapse
rates, even in the early stages of AGCT [13,14]. In AGCT patients with
stage IC, there were no differences in relapse-free survival between
patients with or without adjuvant chemotherapy [14]. Adjuvant
chemotherapy is not shown to protect against relapse in patients with
adult type AGCT [8]. The most widely used first-line adjuvant treatment
regimen in patients with AGCT is BEP regimen. Platinum-based
chemotherapy is currently used for patients with advanced stages or a
recurring disease, with a total response rate of 63% to 80%. Combination
chemotherapy with taxes and platinum appears to be a suitable regimen
for further research [15]. The gynecological oncology group (GOG) is
currently conducting a randomized phase II trial, the results of which
are expected in 2024, by comparing the effect of the TC regimen with the
BEP regimen on progressive survival in adult GCT patients
(ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier NCT01042522). It is expected that the TC
regimen may be associated with relatively lower toxicity and similar
non-progressive survival compared to the BEP regimen.
Hormone therapy based on progestogens (megestrol) and
gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists [16-18] is considered to be a
promising direction for the palliative treatment of GCT relapses. It was
also shown promising results of the use of aromatase inhibitors in
relapses of AGCT [19,20]. The efficacy of targeted therapy,
particularly, mTOR inhibitors and tyrosine kinase inhibitors in the
treatment of GCT, is currently being investigated [21,22].
Discussion
GCT are rare low-grade malignant sex cord-stromal tumors
with indolent behavior. The etiology of GKO, like most ovarian
epithelial tumors, is unknown. GKO of the ovaries are distinguished
by their ability to secrete sex steroid hormones (estrogens), and
glycoprotein hormone inhibin, which are used in the clinic as
tumor markers. So, the majority of patients are diagnosed at early
stage [6,23]. The main risk factors of AGCT include nulliparity,
fatness, oral contraceptives and family cancer history. The recent
studies provided powerful evidences that fork head box protein L2
(FOXL2), PI3K/AKT signaling pathway, TGF-β signaling pathway,
Notch signaling pathway and etc. were involved in granulosa cell
tumor through influencing cell proliferation and apoptosis [24].
More and more clinical data show that FOXL2 mutation is the main
factor in AGCT. So, understanding the FOXL2 regulation mechanism
is instrumental to develop new prevention and therapy methods
[25]. The main treatment is surgery [6-8]. Most clinicians agree
that in patients of a young and young age with stage IA disease
can be limited to unilateral adnexectomy with adequate surgical
staging, which allows these women to maintain reproductive
function [7,8]. At the pre- and postmenopausal age, preference is
given to radical surgery in the amount of extirpation of the uterus
with appendages and removal of the momentum with mandatory
optimal surgical staging [5,6,8,9,15]. Stage of the disease is an
independent prognostic factor for the occurrence of a relapse of
the disease [9,10]. Adjuvant chemotherapy is not shown to protect
against relapse in patients with adult type AGCT [8]. High recurrent
rate is the most critical factor for GCT death. At present, the most
important problem lies in the early diagnosis and prevention of
recurrence. Studies showed that hormones play a critical role in the
pathogenesis and treatment of GCT, especially in some ineffective
cases for radiotherapy and chemotherapy [24,25]. Targeting
drugs for signal pathway in the subsequent chemotherapy can
significantly improve the survival rate of patients [21,22,24,25].
Conclusion
There were not found significant difference in the overall and
relapse-free survival of patients with ovarian AGCT, depending
on the options of surgical and drug treatment they underwent.
Additional multicenter randomized trials are needed to clarify the
effectiveness of the various options for surgical and drug treatment
of adult GCT patients.
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