Abstract
Background: We assessed long-term patient-reported dysphagia and xerostomia outcomes following definitive surgical management with transoral robotic surgery (TORS) in patients with oropharyngeal cancer (OPC) via a cross-sectional survey study. Methods: Patients with OPC managed with primary oropharyngeal surgery as definitive treatment at least 1 year ago between 2015 and 2019 were identified. The M. D. Anderson Dysphagia Inventory (MDADI) and Xerostomia Inventory (XI) scores were compared across treatment types (i.e., no adjuvant therapy [TORS-A] vs. adjuvant radiotherapy [TORS+RT] vs. adjuvant chemoradiotherapy [TORS+CT/RT]). Results: The sample had 62 patients (10 TORS-A, 30 TORS+RT, 22 TORS+CT/RT). TORS-A had clinically and statistically significantly better MDADI scores than TORS+RT (p = 0.03) and TORS+CT/RT (p = 0.02), but TORS+RT and TORS+CT/RT were not significantly different. TORS-A had clinically and statistically significantly less XI than TORS+RT (p < 0.01) and TORS+CT/RT (p < 0.01). Conclusions: Patients with OPC who have undergone TORS+RT or TORS+CT/RT following surgery face clinically worse dysphagia and xerostomia outcomes relative to patients who undergo TORS-A.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 3955-3965 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | Head and Neck |
Volume | 43 |
Issue number | 12 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Dec 2021 |
Funding
This work was supported, in part, by the National Institutes of Health's National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (grant number UL1TR001422).
Keywords
- The M. D. Anderson Dysphagia Inventory
- Xerostomia Inventory
- adjuvant chemoradiotherapy
- adjuvant radiotherapy
- oropharyngeal cancer
- patient-reported outcomes
- primary oropharyngeal surgery
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Otorhinolaryngology