Ovarian cancer: recognition and initial management

Recommendation ID: CG122/5
Question: The value of primary surgery for women with advanced ovarian cancer:- Research should be undertaken to determine the effectiveness of primary surgery for women with advanced ovarian cancer whose tumour cannot be fully excised.
Any explanatory notes (if applicable): Why this is important:- Most women with advanced ovarian cancer undergo surgery at some point. Previous studies have shown that surgery after the completion of chemotherapy has no therapeutic value. Studies are being performed to investigate whether the timing of surgery during primary chemotherapy influences outcome. No studies have evaluated whether primary surgery itself has any therapeutic value when compared with chemotherapy alone. The potential advantages of surgery have to be offset against the morbidity, occasional mortality and undoubted costs associated with it. This would be a prospective randomised clinical trial recruiting women who have biopsy-proven advanced ovarian cancer and who are fit enough to receive surgery and chemotherapy. Women would be randomised to either chemotherapy and surgery (conventional arm) or chemotherapy alone (experimental arm). Primary outcome measures would be survival at 1 and 5 years.

Source guidance details

Is this a recommendation for the use of a technology only in the context of research?	No
Is it a recommendation that suggests collection of data or the establishment of a register?	No