The Current Characteristics of Treatment for Glomus Jugulare Tumors. Results of the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program Database

Introduction: Glomus jugulare (GJ) is a benign and rare neuroendocrine paraganglioma of the head. Optimal therapeutic sequences for GJ are controversial with surgical and radiotherapeutic arms currently available. The purpose of this investigation is to determine the effects of GJ size on therapeutic courses.

Methods: This investigation queried the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) for GJ cases. Our study includes 17 cancer registries between the years 2000-2020. Cases were identified using the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) for Oncology, Third Revision morphology codes (8690/1). Tumor size was treated as a continuous variable and categorical variable ( < 10 mm2, 10+ mm2, 30 mm2). Logistic and linear regression analysis was completed for correlation studies. P-values less than 0.05 were considered significant.

Results: 41 total patients were included in this study. The majority were over 50 (78%), female (70%), White (40%), and located on the Aortic Body (58%). Partial excision was the major surgical course (45%) with a minority receiving radiotherapy (35%). Tumor size was the only predictor for therapeutic courses on regression analysis. Each 1 mm2 increase in tumor size was shown to decrease chances of partial excision by 8.9% (p < 0.01). Tumors 10+ mm2 were 95% more likely to have no surgery than tumors < 10 mm2 and tumors 10+ mm2 were 94.3% more likely to have partial excision than 30+ mm2 tumors. Every 1 mm2 increase in tumor size increases radiotherapy by 15.8%.

Conclusion : Escalating tumor size decreases surgical course while increasing radiotherapy in GJ patients. Tumor size is the only variable shown to affect the sequence of treatment. Future studies should review the effects of radiotherapy on complication rates over surgery in escalating tumor sizes.