Management of testicular cancer - 16 years' experience from southwest Finland

Objective: This study investigated the outcome of testicular cancer treatme nt in Finland. Material and methods: Data on 88 testicular cancer patients treated in Turku University Central Hospital between 1976 and 1992 were stu died to analyse outcome and survival. Results: The histological diagnosis w as seminoma for 39 patients and non-seminoma for 49 patients. Two seminoma patients relapsed (5%) and one patient died of progressive disease (3%; ini tially stage II seminoma). Eleven non-seminoma patients relapsed (22%). nin e of whom were cured with chemotherapy. Four non-seminoma patients died of progressive disease (8%; initially one stage I non-seminoma and three stage III non-seminomas). The median time to relapse after the completion of tre atment was 9 months (range 3-50 months). Non-seminoma patients had signific antly more relapses than seminoma patients (p = 0.03). Most relapses (73% o f the non-seminoma relapses) were found among the stage I non-seminoma pati ents who had not received adjuvant chemotherapy, while none of the stage I seminoma patients relapsed (p = 0.007). Conclusions: Close surveillance is important for all non-seminoma patients to guarantee the early detection an d treatment of recurrent disease. Treatment and surveillance should be cove red by national guidelines and be conducted in centres with special interes t in this rare but mostly curable cancer.