Abstract
BACKGROUND: Surgery for advanced ovarian cancer tends to be extensive. We performed an analysis to determine whether perioperative red blood cell transfusion (PRBCT) is associated with a poor prognosis in women with epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). METHODS: Our retrospective analysis included 314 women. The Mann-Whitney rank-sum test and chi-square test were used to analyze the clinical characteristics of the PRBCT and non-PRBCT groups, and Cox proportional hazard models were used for the multivariate analysis. RESULTS: PRBCT was associated with higher relapse and mortality rates in 121 (38.54 %) patients. After multivariate analysis, transfused patients were 1.59 times at risk of death (hazard ratio [HR] = 1.59; 95%CI, 1.12-2.25) and 1.63 times at risk of recurrence (HR = 1.63; 95%CI, 1.22-2.18) than non-transfused patients. CONCLUSIONS: PRBCT could prolong hospital stay, and increased hospital costs were significantly associated with increased cancer recurrence and overall mortality in patients with EOC.