Patients and clinical features
A total of 140 patients with NPC were treated in our hospital throughout the study period. Of them, only 73 patients had detailed documentation of their clinical and radiographic examination of their middle ear status on presentation and follow up and were thus included in our study. The mean age of patients was 54.92 (range 18.8 to 79.67 years) and the majority were male (71.2%). 32 patients were smokers (43.8%). Most patients had an advanced disease at primary site at presentation with 31 patients (42.5%) presenting as T4 and 16 as T3 disease (21.9%). Fifty-eight (79.5%) patients presented with nodal disease (79.5% were N1 and greater) and five patients (6.8%) presented with a metastatic disease as presented in Table 1. The median follow-up time was 4.98 years (range 1-16.8 years) following completion of treatment.
Out of the 73 patients, 17 were treated using 2D/3D-CRT and 56 with intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT). The mean radiation dose delivered to the primary site was 68.99 Gy (range 60 to 72 Gy). 70 patients (95.9%) received concurrent chemotherapy. The remaining 3 patients presented with an early-stage disease (2 patients with T1 and one with T2) with N0 and were treated with definitive RT with no chemotherapy.