Pancreatic Cancer with Vascular Involvement: Adherence to Current Standard-of-Care Associated with Improved Survival

Multiagent chemotherapy regimens have revolutionized the treatment of patients with localized pancreatic cancer. Therefore, current guidelines recommend neoadjuvant multiagent chemotherapy (N-MAC) for patients with borderline resectable or locally advanced pancreatic cancer. Methods This study is a retrospective cohort study of National Cancer Data Base (NCDB) data for pancreatic cancer with vascular involvement. Results A total of 23 903 patients with vascular involvement were included and divided into 3 groups; no treatment (40.6%), medical treatment (36.6%), and resection (22.8%). Of the patients undergoing resection, 31.3% received neoadjuvant multiagent chemotherapy (N-MAC). The remainder were treated with postoperative adjuvant treatment (33.8%), surgery alone (24.9%), preoperative radiotherapy (8.3%), or single-agent preoperative chemotherapy (1.7%). Median survival for N-MAC was superior (28.42 months) when compared to neoadjuvant radiotherapy (20.73 months), neoadjuvant single-agent chemotherapy (20.8 months), postoperative adjuvant therapy (17.87 months), and surgery alone (10.12 months). N-MAC was associated with improved survival compared to postoperative multiagent chemotherapy (P-MAC) (28.4 vs 16.95, HR 1.82; CI 1.64-2.02, P < .0010) (Figure 1). The addition of radiation therapy to N-MAC did not improve survival (27.4 vs 29.8, HR .93; CI .83-1.05, P = .3). Clinical downstaging occurred in 40% of patients treated with N-MAC, and downstaging was associated with improved survival (HR .74; CI .64-.85, P < .001). N-MAC patients were more likely to undergo an R0 resection than P-MAC (74% v. 48, P < .001). Conclusions Most resected pancreatic cancer patients in this study with vascular involvement receive either postoperative or no adjuvant therapy. N-MAC increases downstaging, R0 resection rates, and survival.