Prognostic effect of pregnancy on young female patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma: results from a matched cohort analysis

// Lu Zhang 1, 2, * , Huai Liu 4, 5, 6, * , Lin-Quan Tang 1, 2 , Qiu-Yan Chen 1, 2 , Shan-Shan Guo 1, 2 , Li-Ting Liu 1, 2 , Ling Guo 1, 2 , Hao-Yuan Mo 1, 2 , Chong Zhao 1, 2 , Xiang Guo 1, 2 , Ka-Jia Cao 1, 2 , Chao-Nan Qian 1, 2 , Mu-Sheng Zeng 1 , Jian-Yong Shao 1, 7 , Ying Sun 1, 8 , Jun Ma 1, 8 , Ming-Huang Hong 1, 3 , Hai-Qiang Mai 1, 2 1 Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, State Key Laboratory of Oncology in South China, Collaborative Innovation Center for Cancer Medicine, Guangzhou, P. R. China 2 Department of Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, P. R. China 3 GCP center, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, P. R. China 4 Department of Radiotherapy, Hunan Cancer Hospital, Changsha, P. R. China 5 Department of Radiotherapy, The Affiliated Cancer Hospital of Xiangya School of Medicine, Central South University, Changsha, P. R. China 6 Key Laboratory of Translational Radiation Oncology, Changsha, P. R. China 7 Department of Molecular Diagnostics, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, P. R. China 8 Department of Radiation Oncology, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, P. R. China * These authors contributed equally to this work Correspondence to: Ming-Huang Hong, e-mail: hongmh@sysucc.org.cn Hai-Qiang Mai, e-mail: maihq@sysucc.org.cn Keywords: nasopharyngeal carcinoma, pregnancy, prognosis, survival Received: December 10, 2015 Accepted: February 21, 2016 Published: March 09, 2016 ABSTRACT Objectives: We aimed to evaluate the prognosis of pregnancy-associated patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) in a young population. Methods: From June 1999 to December 2010, 51 patients aged ≤ 35 years who were diagnosed with NPC during pregnancy or within one year after delivery were admitted into the pregnancy-associated group in our institution. An additional 51 patients who were not pregnant at diagnosis were selected from 451 patients based on the matching criteria to match the pregnancy-associated female patients. The primary endpoint was overall survival (OS). The secondary endpoints were progression-free survival (PFS) and distant-metastasis failure-free survival (DMFS) and locoregional failure-free survival (LRFS). Results: The advanced stage was not different between the pregnant and the non-pregnant group before matching (69.8% vs. 70.3%, P = 0.690). No difference in OS at the median follow-up time of 92 months was observed between the pregnancy-associated and the non-pregnant group (85.4% vs. 92.2%, P = 0.478); likewise, no differences were observed regarding PFS and DMFS. However, the pregnancy-associated group had worse LRFS than the non-pregnant group (84.8% vs. 95.9%, P = 0.033). When the pregnancy-associated patients were dichotomized into an early pregnancy group and a late pregnancy group, our data showed that pregnancy interval did not seem to impact the risk of death or relapse. Conclusion: Our results show that patients in the pregnant group did not seem to have more advanced stage or inferior survival than that in the non-pregnant group.