Radiation Therapy Alone Versus Radiation Therapy Plus Radiofrequency Ablation (RFA)/Vertebral Augmentation

Description

All supportive therapy for optimal medical care will be given during the study period at the discretion of the attending physician(s) within the parameters of the protocol and documented on each site’s source documents as concomitant medication.

The study will be adequately powered with 52 patients (35 in the RT plus PVA/RFA arm and 17 in the RT arm). Assuming a 5% ineligibility rate, a death rate of 15%, and a patient non-compliance rate of 15%, the total sample size required would be 80 patients.

Patients will be stratified according to the tumor type (radioresistant [soft tissue sarcoma, melanoma, and renal cell carcinoma] versus other types). The treatment allocation scheme described by Zelen (1974) will be used because it balances patient factors. Within each stratum, patients will be randomized in a 2:1 ratio to either image-guided RT plus RFA/PVA or external beam RT alone.

The 2:1 randomization allocation will be used to accommodate increased demand for image-guided RT plus RFA/PVA.