Is IORT ready for roll-out? Emanuela Esposito1, 2, 3, Bauke Anninga1, Ian Honey4, Gillian Ross5, Dick Rainsbury6, Siobhan Laws6, Sygriet Rinsma1 and Michael Douek1 1Research Oncology, Division of Cancer Studies, King’s College London, Guy’s Hospital, Great Maze Pond, London SE1 9RT, UK 2Department of Breast Surgery, Istituto Nazionale per lo Studio e la Cura dei Tumori ‘Fondazione Giovanni Pascale’ – IRCCS, Naples 80131, Italy 3Department of Clinical Medicine and Surgery, Breast Unit, University of Naples Federico II, Naples 80131, Italy 4Department of Medical Physics Floor 3, Henriette Raphael House, Guy’s and St Thomas Hospital, London SE1 9RT, UK 5Clinical Oncology, Royal Marsden Hospital and Institute of Cancer Research, London SW3 6JJ, UK 6Oncoplastic Breast Unit, Royal Hampshire County Hospital, Winchester SO22 5DG, UK Correspondence to: Emanuela Esposito and Michael Douek. Email:
[email protected] and
[email protected] Abstract Two large randomised controlled trials of intraoperative radiotherapy (IORT) in breast-conserving surgery (TARGIT-A and ELIOT) have been published 14 years after their launch. Neither the TARGIT-A trial nor the ELIOT trial results have changed the current clinical practice for the use of IORT. The in-breast local recurrence rate (LRR) after IORT met the pre-specified non-inferiority margins in both trials and was 3.3% in TARGIT-A and 4.4% in the ELIOT trial. In both trials, the pre-specified estimates for local recurrence (LR) with external beam Review radiation therapy (EBRT) significantly overestimated actual LRR. In the TARGIT-A trial, LR with EBRT was estimated at the outset to be 6%, and in the ELIOT trial, it was estimated to be 3%.