Efficacy of NB09 regimen in chemotherapy for childhood ultra high-risk neuroblastoma

Objective: To evaluate the efficacy of NB09 regimen in chemotherapy for children with ultra high-risk neuroblastoma (NB).Methods: The clinical and follow-up data of sixty-three children with ultra high-risk NB who had received chemotherapy with NB09 regimen or high-risk A/B regimen in Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital from April 2001 to April 2014 were retrospectively analyzed. The efficacy of NB09 regimen was accessed by comparing the surgical resection rate, short-term treatment outcomes, recurrence and survival between these two regimens.Results: Thirty-three patients were treated with NB09 regimen, and other 30 patients were treated with high-risk A/B regimen. There were no statistic differences in gender, age, pathology, primary lesion site, metastatic site, and treatment with radiotherapy between two groups (all P > 0.05). At the end of treatment, there were no significant differences in complete remission plus very good partial remission rate (75.8% vs 73.3%) and effective surgical resection rate (81.8% vs 90.0%) between two groups (both P > 0.05). Kaplan-Meier method and log-rank test showed that the overall survival and event-free survival of NB09 group were significantly better than those of the high-risk A/B group (both P < 0.05). The 2-year recurrence rate of NB09 group was significantly lower than that of the high-risk A/B group (P < 0.05).Conclusion: Chemotherapy with NB09 regimen can reduce the recurrence rate and prolong the survival time of children with high-risk NB, showing a positive clinical effect. DOI:10.3781/j.issn.1000-7431.2016.33.709