Loss of psoas major muscle volume during systemic chemotherapy is related to worse prognosis in testicular cancer.

Objective: In several cancers, the loss of skeletal muscle is well associated with oncological outcome. However, its effect is unknown in testicular cancer. This study evaluated the prognostic impact of psoas major muscle volume loss during systemic chemotherapy.

Methods: This was a retrospective study of patients who underwent chemotherapy from 2008 to 2017. Psoas major muscle volume was calculated by volume analyzer software, and its loss was calculated during systemic chemotherapy. The patients were divided according to muscle volume loss: Group 1 (<20%) and Group 2 (≥20%). The losses were compared with Kaplan-Meier curves, and a Cox proportional hazard model was applied to test predictors of poor prognosis.

Results: Fifty patients were included. Seventeen were classified into Group 1, and 33 into Group 2. The Kaplan-Meier curves revealed that the progression-free and the overall survival of Group 1 were significantly better than those of Group 2 (P = 0.002, P = 0.03, respectively). A multivariate analysis identified psoas major muscle volume loss as a significant and independent predictor of poor prognosis.

Conclusions: Patients with psoas major muscle volume loss during chemotherapy had a significantly worse prognosis than those without loss.