The primary objective of this study was to determine whether sentinel node (SN) biopsy is accurate in operable oral and oropharyngeal cT1-T2N0 cancer (OC). For it, around 307 patients with OC were arbitrarily appointed to (1) the ND arm or (2) the SN arm (exploratory arm: biopsy alone if negative, or followed by ND if positive, during essential tumor surgery). There were two major outcomes which were recorded, the primary outcome was neck node recurrence-free survival (RFS) at 2 years. Secondary outcomes were 5-year neck node RFS, 2- and 5-year disease-specific survival (DSS). The results reflected that on 279 patients (139 ND and 140 SN) could be analyzed. Neck node RFS was 89.6% (95% CI, 0.83% to 0.94%) at 2 years in the ND arm and 90.7% (95% CI, 0.84% to 0.95%) in the SN arm, confirming the equivalence with P < .01. And the functional outcomes were significantly worse in the ND arm until 6 months after surgery. Hence as a conclusion it can be said that this study was helpful to determine the oncologic equivalence of the SN and ND approaches, with lower morbidity in the SN arm after surgery (6 months).
Ref link – https://ascopubs.org/doi/full/10.1200/JCO.20.01661
