National trends and determinants of proton therapy use for prostate cancer: A National Cancer Data Base study

Abstract

BACKGROUND In the current study, the authors sought to both characterize the national trends in proton therapy use for prostate cancer and determine the factors associated with receipt of this limited resource, using what to the best of their knowledge is the largest nationwide cancer registry. METHODS The National Cancer Data Base was used to identify 187,730 patients diagnosed with nonmetastatic prostate cancer from 2004 through 2012 who received external beam radiotherapy as their initial form of definitive therapy. Multivariable logistic regression analysis adjusted for sociodemographic and clinical factors was used to identify independent determinants of proton therapy use. RESULTS The rate of proton therapy use increased significantly from 2.3% in 2004 to 5.2% in 2011 and 4.8% in 2012 (P value for trend