Postoperative radiotherapy after flap reconstructive surgery in patients with head and neck cancer: A retrospective monocentric study with flap delineation to assess toxicity and relapse

摘要

Purpose. - Flaps are increasingly used during reconstructive surgery of head and neck cancers to improve functional outcomes. There are no guidelines as to whether the whole flap or its anastomotic border should be included in the primary tumour target volume of postoperative radiotherapy to prevent local relapses. Relapse and toxicity rates can increase substantially if the whole flap received full dose. Our aim was to determine whether flaps were included in the primary tumour target volume and to report the patterns of relapse and toxicity.