Comparison of Radical Surgery and Radiotherapy for the Treatment of Early-Stage Cervical Carcinoma: A Meta-Analysis

Abstract

<b><i>Objective:</i></b> To compare the efficacy and safety of radical surgery with radiotherapy in patients with early-stage cervical carcinoma. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> PubMed, Web of Science, and Embase were systematically reviewed, and studies comparing radical surgery with radiotherapy were included. The main efficacy outcomes included overall survival (OS), and disease-free survival (DFS). Safety endpoints were adverse events. Hazard ratios (HR) or risk ratios (RR) with 95% CI were used to pool the estimates. <b><i>Results:</i></b> A total of 6 studies were included in this meta-analysis. Radical surgery was associated with comparable survival effects in OS (HR = 0.73; 95% CI 0.46–1.17; <i>p</i> = 0.196) and DFS (HR = 0.84; 95% CI 0.64–1.10; <i>p</i> = 0.207) as compared with radiotherapy. Moreover, positive lymphangiography (HR = 3.67; 95% CI 2.86–4.70; <i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.001), adeno-carcinomatous histotype (HR = 2.53; 95% CI 1.80–3.56; <i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.001), adenosquamous histotype (HR = 1.55; 95% CI 1.27–1.89; <i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.001), tumor size ≥4 cm (HR = 1.60; 95% CI 1.14–2.23; <i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.001), stage IB2 (HR = 1.71; 95% CI 1.43–2.04; <i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.001), and stage IIA (HR = 1.85; 95% CI 1.54–2.22; <i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.001) were all independent predictors of decreased survival. Patients treated with radical surgery had a rate of adverse events similar to that of those treated with radiotherapy (RR = 1.23; 95% CI 0.61–2.48; <i>p</i> = 0.557). <b><i>Conclusion:</i></b> The present study suggested that radical surgery and radiotherapy offered similarly effective treatment in terms of OS and DFS in early-stage cervical carcinoma. Moreover, the complication rate between the 2 treatments was not significantly different. Considering the potential limitations of this study, more large-scale well-designed randomized controlled trials are needed to verify our findings.