Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2018 Oct;140(1):173-178.
doi: 10.1007/s11060-018-2948-8. Epub 2018 Jul 14.

Temporal muscle thickness is an independent prognostic marker in melanoma patients with newly diagnosed brain metastases

Julia Furtner  1   2 , Anna S Berghoff  2   3 , Veronika Schöpf  4   5 , Robert Reumann  3 , Benjamin Pascher  3 , Ramona Woitek  1 , Ulrika Asenbaum  1 , Sebastian Pelster  1 , Johannes Leitner  1 , Georg Widhalm  2   6 , Brigitte Gatterbauer  2   6 , Karin Dieckmann  2   7 , Christoph Höller  8 , Daniela Prayer  1   2 , Matthias Preusser  9   10
Affiliations

Temporal muscle thickness is an independent prognostic marker in melanoma patients with newly diagnosed brain metastases

Julia Furtner et al. J Neurooncol. 2018 Oct.

Abstract

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the prognostic relevance of temporal muscle thickness (TMT) in melanoma patients with newly diagnosed brain metastases.

Methods: TMT was retrospectively assessed in 146 melanoma patients with newly diagnosed brain metastases on cranial magnetic resonance images. Chart review was used to retrieve clinical parameters, including disease-specific graded prognostic assessment (DS-GPA) and survival times.

Results: Patients with a TMT > median showed a statistically significant increase in survival time (13 months) compared to patients with a TMT < median (5 months; p < 0.001; log rank test). A Cox regression model revealed that the risk of death was increased by 27.9% with every millimeter reduction in TMT. In the multivariate analysis, TMT (HR 0.724; 95% 0.642-0.816; < 0.001) and DS-GPA (HR 1.214; 95% CI 1.023-1.439; p = 0.026) showed a statistically significant correlation with overall survival.

Conclusion: TMT is an independent predictor of survival in melanoma patients with brain metastases. This parameter may aid in patient selection for clinical trials or to the choice of different treatment options based on the determination of frail patient populations.

Keywords: Brain; Melanoma; Neoplasm metastasis; Prognosis; Sarcopenia.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the ethics committee of the Medical University of Vienna (Vote 078/2004) and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed consent

Due to the retrospective nature of this study, informed consent was waived by the ethics committee.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
TMT assessment represented on brain MR images. a A 77-year-old male patient with an overall survival of 15 months (median TMT = 8.8 mm), and b a 73-year-old male patient with an overall survival of 3 month (median TMT = 2.8 mm)
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Overall survival according to median TMT
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Nayak L, Lee EQ, Wen PY. Epidemiology of brain metastases. Curr Oncol Rep. 2012;14:48–54. doi: 10.1007/s11912-011-0203-y. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Berghoff AS, Schur S, Füreder LM, Gatterbauer B, Dieckmann K, Widhalm G, et al. Descriptive statistical analysis of a real life cohort of 2419 patients with brain metastases of solid cancers. ESMO Open. 2016;16:1:e000024. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Davies MA, Liu P, McIntyre S, Kim KB, Papadopoulos N, Hwu WJ, et al. Prognostic factors for survival in melanoma patients with brain metastases. Cancer. 2011;15:1687–1696. doi: 10.1002/cncr.25634. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Bottoni U, Clerico R, Paolino G, Ambrifi M, Corsetti P, Calvieri S. Predictors and survival in patients with melanoma brain metastases. Med Oncol. 2013;30:466. doi: 10.1007/s12032-013-0466-2. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Vecchio S, Spagnolo F, Merlo DF, Signori A, Acquati M, Pronzato P, et al. The treatment of melanoma brain metastases before the advent of targeted therapies: associations between therapeutic choice, clinical symptoms and outcome with survival. Melanoma Res. 2014;24:61–67. doi: 10.1097/CMR.0000000000000029. - DOI - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources