Aim To investigate whether the American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) clinical category cT2b needs to be subclassified by the type and distribution of retinoblastoma (RB) seeding. Methods... Show moreAim To investigate whether the American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) clinical category cT2b needs to be subclassified by the type and distribution of retinoblastoma (RB) seeding. Methods Multicentre, international registry-based data were collected from RB centres enrolled between January 2001 and December 2013. 1054 RB eyes with vitreous or subretinal seeds from 18 ophthalmic oncology centres, in 13 countries within six continents were analysed. Local treatment failure was defined as the use of secondary enucleation or external beam radiation therapy (EBRT) and was estimated with the Kaplan-Meier method. Results Clinical category cT2b included 1054 eyes. Median age at presentation was 16.0 months. Of these, 428 (40.6%) eyes were salvaged, and 430 (40.8%) were treated with primary and 196 (18.6%) with secondary enucleation. Of the 592 eyes that had complete data for globe salvage analysis, the distribution of seeds was focal in 143 (24.2%) and diffuse in 449 (75.8%). The 5-year Kaplan-Meier cumulative globe-salvage (without EBRT) was 78% and 49% for eyes with focal and diffuse RB seeding, respectively. Cox proportional hazards regression analysis confirmed a higher local treatment failure risk with diffuse seeds as compared with focal seeds (hazard rate: 2.8; p<0.001). There was insufficient evidence to prove or disprove an association between vitreous seed type and local treatment failure risk(p=0.06). Conclusion This international, multicentre, registry-based analysis of RB eyes affirmed that eyes with diffuse intraocular distribution of RB seeds at diagnosis had a higher risk of local treatment failure when compared with focal seeds. Subclassification of AJCC RB category cT2b into focal vs diffuse seeds will improve prognostication for eye salvage. Show less
Objective To analyse ocular and systemic findings of patients presenting with systemic metastasis. Methods and analysis It is an international, multicentre, internet-enabled, registry-based... Show moreObjective To analyse ocular and systemic findings of patients presenting with systemic metastasis. Methods and analysis It is an international, multicentre, internet-enabled, registry-based retrospective data analysis. Patients were diagnosed between 2001 and 2011. Data included: primary tumour dimensions, extrascleral extension, ciliary body involvement, American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC)-tumour, node, metastasis staging, characteristics of metastases. Results Of 3610 patients with uveal melanoma, 69 (1.9%; 95% CI 1.5 to 2.4) presented with clinical metastasis (stage IV). These melanomas originated in the iris, ciliary body and choroid in 4%, 16% and 80% of eyes, respectively. Using eighth edition AJCC, 8 (11%), 20 (29%), 24 (35%), and 17 (25%) belonged to AJCC T-categories T1-T4. Risk of synchronous metastases increased from 0.7% (T1) to 1.5% (T2), 2.6% (T3) and 7.9% (T4). Regional lymph node metastases (N1a) were detected in 9 (13%) patients of whom 6 (67%) had extrascleral extension. Stage of systemic metastases (known for 40 (59%) stage IV patients) revealed 14 (35%), 25 (63%) and 1 (2%) had small (M1a), medium-sized (M1b) and large-sized (M1c) metastases, respectively. Location of metastases in stage IV patients were liver (91%), lung (16%), bone (9%), brain (6%), subcutaneous tissue (4%) and others (5%). Multiple sites of metastases were noted in 24%. Compared with the 98.1% of patients who did not present with metastases, those with synchronous metastases had larger intraocular tumours, more frequent extrascleral extension, ciliary body involvement and thus a higher AJCC T-category. Conclusions Though higher AJCC T-stage was associated with risk for metastases at diagnosis, even small T1 tumours were stage IV at initial presentation. The liver was the most common site of metastases; however, frequent multiorgan involvement supports initial whole-body staging. Show less
