ABSTRACT
Staging of non-extremity lesions: retroperitoneal and visceral sarcomas There is no adequate staging system for visceral and retroperitoneal sarcomas. The majority of patients present with large lesions and the majority of visceral sarcomas are high grade, although there are many clinicians and pathologists who prefer not to grade gastrointestinal stromal tumors. In the retroperitoneum, the very large tumors are often low-grade liposarcomas, many of which contain focal areas of high-grade histology. As opposed to extremity lesions, where local recurrence is rarely the cause of death, local recurrence of visceral and retroperitoneal tumors is often lethal. Staging, therefore, focuses on their large size and grade as the best predictor of outcome in the absence of known metastasis. The major predictor of survival is complete resection. Analysis of patients having complete resection shows only grade to be a secondary factor in long-term survival (see Chapter 6).
