Outcomes of Resectable Gallbladder Cancer: A Retrospective Analysis From a Tertiary Care Centre in India

Background Gallbladder carcinoma (GBC) has deleterious outcomes, but due to its reduced incidence in Western countries, there is a paucity of data on this disease. Here we report the outcomes of a retrospective analysis of resectable gallbladder cancer from a tertiary cancer centre in eastern India. The primary objective of this study is to evaluate the overall survival (OS) and relapse-free survival (RFS) rates among patients with resectable GBC. Methods A retrospective analysis was carried out on patients who underwent radical surgery between 2007 and 2022 and received various neoadjuvant and adjuvant chemotherapy methods. Patients who had adjuvant chemoradiotherapy concurrently or who did not receive adjuvant therapy were excluded. All the baseline clinicopathological characteristics were retrieved from electronic medical records. The survival data were collected from records of follow-up visits as well as telephonic calls to the patients who were lost to follow-up. Simple proportions were used for baseline characteristics, and the Kaplan-Meier method was used for survival analysis. Results A total of 161 patients were identified, and data were captured from electronic medical records. The included patients' ages ranged between 26 and 80 years, with a median age of 56 years. Among the participants, 103 were female (64%) and 58 (36%) were male. Among the 161 patients, the median number of lymph nodes harvested was nine (ranging from one to 43), and only three patients were margin-positive. The tumour, nodes, and metastasis (TNM) distributions were as follows: pT2 in 111 patients (70.25%), pT3 in 44 patients (27.85%), and pT4 in three patients (1.90%). The nodal statuses were pN0 in 91 patients (61.9%), pN1 in 51 patients (34.69%), and pN2 in five patients (3.4%). The majority (64%) received single-agent capecitabine, 27% received gemcitabine-based platinum doublet therapy, and 4.3% received neoadjuvant therapy. Of the full sample, 2.4% received concurrent adjuvant chemo plus radiation therapy, and three patients did not receive any adjuvant therapy. Additionally, among the 161 patients, 34.16% had a relapse, with 47% being local and 52% being distant relapses. The median follow-up was 49 months (interquartile range (IQR) 23-71 months). The 24-month RFS rate was 67.1% (SD+/- 4.3%), and the 24-month OS rate was 78.1% (SD+/- 4.1%). Conclusion Our data, which is from one of the largest samples from India, show that resectable gallbladder cancer has very good outcomes after radical surgery and adjuvant chemotherapy. There was a higher proportion of T2 and node-negative disease, which could have led to better survival compared to published literature.