Pitfalls in pre-operative prediction of lymph node metastasis in early endometrial cancer

Abstract Objective The role of lymphadenectomy in early stage endometrial cancer is controversial as it is associated with intra-operative complications and its therapeutic benefit is not established. Prediction of lymph nodal metastasis so as to perform selective lymph node dissection is desirable. This study was conducted to study grade of the tumor obtained by endometrial biopsy specimen and depth of myometrial invasion assessed by imaging pre-operatively as predictors of lymph nodal metastasis in early endometrial cancers. Methods Our study was a cross sectional study done in a tertiary care center in south India, where 100 patients were studied from August 2016 to May 2018. After Ethical Committee clearance, all patients who were diagnosed with early endometrial cancer and who underwent surgery in our hospital were included in the study after getting informed consent. Pre-operative tumor grade and depth of myometrial invasion were studied as predictors of lymph nodal metastasis. They were also correlated with post-operative grade and myometrial invasion. Results The present study recruited 100 women of which 3 cases were excluded because of non-endometrioid histology. The incidence of positive lymph node metastasis in our study was 18.6%. Both pre-operative tumor grade and depth of myometrial invasion were not significantly associated with lymph node metastasis. There was significant variation between pre-operative and post-operative tumor grade and depth of myometrial invasion. Among post-operative histopathological factors, only lymphovascular space invasion was found to be significantly associated with lymph node metastasis. Conclusion In our study, neither pre-operative nor post-operative grade of the tumor and depth of myometrial invasion were significantly associated with lymph node metastasis. There was considerable variation between pre-op and post-op grade of the tumor making pre-op grade an unreliable factor in predicting lymph node metastasis in endometrial cancer. Among post-operative histopathological factors, only lymphovascular space invasion was found to be significantly associated with lymph node metastasis. Key message Considerable variation between pre-op and post-op grade of the tumor makes pre-op grade an unreliable factor in predicting lymph node metastasis in endometrial cancer