Every year, approximately 100,000 people worldwide are diagnosed as having diffuse gliomas. Glioblastoma multiform (GBM), the most lethal glioma, accounts for 75% of all diffuse glioma diagnoses and has a median overall survival of 14–17 months. The standard initial approach for GBM is maximal safe surgical resection, which is followed by radiotherapy (RT) (60 Gray [Gy] over 6 weeks) with concomitant daily Temozolomide (TMZ) and a further 6 cycles of maintenance TMZ.
Extending TMZ beyond 6 cycles has been shown to delay disease progression in some studies. Some guidelines suggest that this strategy is to be considered in patients with partial response or with continuing radiological improvement at the end of the 6th cycle. The residual disease is however expected in all patients with GBM and thus, it is hoped that additional cycles of TMZ will delay recurrence.
AIM OF THE WORK
This is a retrospective study to assess the impact of extended Temozolomide (TMZ) maintenance therapy (more than 6 cycles) in comparison with standard 6 cycles of TMZ maintenance therapy on overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) in glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) patients.