CAJ | 학술논문

Soft tissue sarcomas (STS) are a heterogeneous group of tumors of mesodermal origin. Although they are rare, nearly half of patients diagnosed will die from the disease at last, which almost has not been changed in recent decades. STS can occur any where in the body, but the majority of primary tumors originate in extremities. Accurate pretreatment evaluation is critical and the management requires a multidisciplinary approach which includes various combinations of surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. Treatment aims to ensure long term survival, avoid local recurrence, and maximize patient function while minimizing morbidity. Surgery is the mainstay of treatment in patients with localized disease and ideal primary therapy for resectable tumors. Limb salvage surgery is the standard of care for most patients with soft tissue sarcoma of the extremities. But in many cases, there exist large primary tumors, bulky recurrent tumors, tumors invading critical neurovascular structures, tumor cells which have already transferred to other parts of the body and so on, other treatments like radiotherapy or chemotherapy may be needed. Controversy still exists for isolated limb perfusion (ILP) in the treatment of unresectable extremity sarcomas. ILP has been widely used in European countries already, but it is still in the clinical trial in America at present. This overview is intended as a review of current understanding and treatment of STS, with an emphasis on recent advances.